God of Eyes

I was not completely surprised when in the morning another of Ciel'ostra's successors greeted me with breakfast. Ulia, the lithe catwoman, balanced a large plate on one hand--the back of her hand, which I assumed meant she was bored. She certainly seemed like it.

I watched as Ulia carefully measured the weight of the plate for a moment, then with a careful heave tossed the plate up and snagged it by the rim, catching everything that wanted to bounce or fly wrong back on the plate skillfully, I studied her. Although she had an air of boredom, impatience, and restlessness, she was clearly not young; I guessed she was in her late forties or early fifties, experienced enough that mundane things didn't surprise her, but not yet old, if perhaps on the cusp of it.

"Good morning, Ulia." I was sitting on my bed feeling restless. Some part of me wanted to go through the book again, but I'd been worried about being caught with it, so I had it hidden. I took the plate when she offered it, looking at her and trying to judge her character, and her angle on the situation. Loi had been flirtatious; Miana was shy, but seemed interested in new things. Chibal struck me as uninterested.

"And you, Ryan of Eyes." She looked around the cramped room for only a moment, and I recalled how her stories focused on the details of a place. Her eyes, I noticed, did linger by the spot where the book was hidden... for perhaps an instant. "I have cleaned this room once or twice in my stay here, but I have never seen a person actually live in it. It is a lonely place."

"It is, But I did not come here for the room." I offered her a smile. In spite of the butterflies in my stomach, I forced out the next question. "Will Pal'lud be seeing me today?" I didn't feel anything change; I didn't seem to have broken a taboo by saying her name out loud. Perhaps the mental room where I was with Alanna was different?

"Some days, Pal'lud never even wakes up. I have heard nothing from her so far, but I will ask. If not..." Ulia shrugged. "Last I heard, she wanted each of us to spend some time with you. I suppose she wants your insight into which of us would be a better Vicar."

I smiled tightly, giving nothing away with my face. "Please let me know. I would like to spend some time out of this room." I paused. "I have spent time meditating, and talking with the God of Eyes. But I do not like to be in a place where there is so little to see, and do."

"Your god does not give you the gift of sight beyond sight?" From Ulia's tight smile, I could tell she was teasing. "No visions of faraway lands?"

"I don't ask." I pursed my lips and looked away. "The only thing I'd really want to see, he can't show me."

There was a moment's pause, and then, "Oh... your home on another world." Ulia's voice suddenly fell. "That's beyond his power, then?"

"I am not sure of the details," I admitted. "But it seems so."

"Hm." She looked at me, then shrugged. "I'll go ask about Pal'lud, then. And maybe get you out of this place." She gestured at the plate and turned to the door. "Enjoy breakfast."

"Thank you." When she was gone, I did dig in. It wasn't a lot, but it was warm, and even after Ulia shook it up out of boredom, there was plenty of it.

Within about an hour, she was back, knocking on my door. "Come," she said. "If you are sick and tired of this small cell, I know something far better." As she started down the halls, she sniffed at me. "I sense magic on you. What are you strongest with?"

"What element?" I paused. "I am... not really strong. A little bit of Wind energy. My training is... incomplete. In fact, in many ways I have barely started."

"You have Arts training? Anything?"

"A few days worth of Stillness, the same with Chaos." I thought I saw where this was going. "You want to teach me."

"I wanted to spar. That is the best way to learn, and more fun. But it sounds like you are no warrior." She turned to look at me for a minute as we walked. I wasn't sure exactly what she thought she saw--or thought she didn't. "You fought with wind magic in your battle, yes? A little?"

"A little."

"I will walk you through some things. I promise not to expect too much." She grinned. "Arts training is never fun. It is long hours of going through the same motions over and over. But it always seems to me that the teachers enjoy it more than the students. When I teach others I find it to be true."

"You teach?" I was a little surprised.

"All advanced Artists teach a little. I am mostly working on my own studies lately, combining Time and Space arts into the discipline of Earth." She seemed a little embarrassed. "It is... complicated."

"Really? That is..." I honestly had no basis for comparison, but it had to be many years worth of work. But how many? "...impressive. I have read a little bit about Space Arts, and it seems that mastering that alone would take a great deal of time."

"Yes." Ulia seemed a little distant. "It is odd, in a way. The philosophy behind the arts is so foreign, and everyone who studies it is confused, but none more so than students of Time and Space. The arts themselves are a pair, and the pair makes sense. But I do not understand how the two combine in my mind."

We were standing, now, in a little sheltered room, with another sparring circle laid out on the floor. Two walls were open but for arches supporting the floor above, Ulia quickly doffed every article of clothing but for a thin top and bottom pair, and strode confidently to the center of the circle. As she spoke, I could see she was thinking, lost in a mental image of her arts.

"Space arts are about controlling the world." She set a stance that I recognized from having skimmed through the book of Earth Arts, and moved through what I thought was some kind of martial arts kata--a set of moves to demonstrate and practice things in sequence. As she moved, I vaguely sensed where she was using power--and it was constant. When she stepped, her steps were longer than they should be; when she punched, chopped, and elbowed the air, I could tell she was using something to create phantom limbs beyond her body. "Extensions of yourself... each movement... each thought... each one... every one..."

When the pattern of her kata had her facing towards me, I could clearly see that her palm strike came much closer than it seemed--easily a good three feet past her hand. I was watching intently, and as far as I could tell, it was not a technique she released after she struck; she built or extended a phantom arm in the process of thrusting, as naturally as if it were her own arm. The energy she had to put into the motion... it must have been a lot.

Within two minutes, she was done with the kata, and she paused. She didn't look tired; she was still wrestling with something inside. Then, suddenly, she leaped into something that I thought for a minute might have been a dance; she leaped into the air, spinning, landing on the balls of her feet, and made a bunch of back and forth jumps. As I watched, I understood suddenly what was going on: the jumps were intended to make it hard for her to keep balance. This, then, must be Time Arts; she was forcing herself to pay attention to balance, making small changes that she wouldn't normally have the time to think about.

The kata was very strange. The motions she made were almost nonsense; she would perch on the balls of her feet, then throw herself sideways, then immediately twist in midair to pull her feet back under herself. She would land on the balls of her feet again, and pick one foot up, leap a different direction, pivot, and land on the other foot, in order to leap in another direction.

All throughout, the look on her face was incredibly intense. I could tell that she was focused inside, on her sense of balance, weight, and momentum... and perhaps on some magical senses? I was no expert on that part of it.

Finally, barely a minute later, she paused for breath. "Time arts are about seeing the world faster, doing more in the time you have. It is insanely useful for a warrior, but I do not see how the two are a pair. Both have saved my life, and I have used both at once, but it is clear that Earth arts are not simply using one and then the other. The art is broken into halves and we must complete it, and I do not understand."

I nodded, considering. Of course, coming from earth, the concept of "Spacetime" was something I'd heard growing up, and I simply accepted it... but I had no idea how to describe the concept to a woman from this world, much less how that would help her with her arts. However...

"So Time arts accelerate your ability to perceive? Or to think?"

"To think. To be. The world seems to slow down, but it is myself moving faster. It is a complex use of energy, but..." she shrugged. "Very useful. Fun, too. I sometimes do it for no other reason than to watch the world move slowly."

I nodded. "But you could use it to accelerate any other magic or art. To do more with that art than you could without it."

Ulia gave me a wary look, but nodded. "It is hard to do more than one type of art at once. I am not a mage, not even a Spark magician, but it is true. While using the art, you can do other things... better. I suppose."

"Not better." I was quite for a moment. "What I mean is that you can only do so much at once. How much can you do with Space Arts? How many projections can you control? How much space at once?"

"Two hands and two legs." Ulia put up her dukes, as though it demonstrated anything. After a moment, I stopped and flicked on my ability to see magic--one I had not used in a while. She was actively concentrating energy into her hands and feet, ready to unleash it--

"No, no, stop." I shook my head. "What are you doing?"

Ulia stopped and looked at me, baffled. "I am... doing Space Arts..."

"You are holding energy inside of your hands. Why?"

"So that I am ready."

I looked at her hands. The pattern within seemed to match the shape of her hands, if maybe different in a few specifics. "But with Time Arts, you can be ready as soon as you need to be. You don't need to prepare."

Ulia studied her hands, and nodded. "There is that. However... Space Arts are not a mental discipline. I train my body to..." she trailed off, studying her hands. After a good minute of study, she nodded. "I understand. Earth Arts are broken into a pair because each half is valuable on its own. It is not that I must meld the two techniques; I must learn them all over again, but together. Mind and body together. Prepare faster."

"Not just faster." To me, this all made sense--but how could I explain in a world without computers, without high speed cameras? She likely didn't understand just how slow humans were in the grand scheme of the universe, or how much more the brain could learn to do. "Flexibly. More than just making fists without preparing, you can make a hand that you control. You can make anything you ...envision." I was going to say 'imagine', but I thought she might not appreciate that word.

She looked at me, and suddenly I thought she was scrutinizing me very closely. "You are a very strange man, Ryan of Eyes. You do not know the Arts, but you speak as though you are the one who made them. You talk as though you can clearly see the meaning that is, to us, hidden in a deep mist." She glanced down at her hands, flexed them a little bit, and then shook her head. "I said I would teach you, and you have taught me. I should at least return the favor."

"If you want to continue--"

"You have given me something to think through," interrupted Ulia. "And next I must think and feel, with my mind and body. For now, though, I will walk you through the first kata of the Stillness Arts." She stepped back. "Take off your shoes, and... anything else you feel is too heavy."

So I did, and stood in the center of the circle, and Ulia instructed me. There were routine exercises, which contained no surprises. After that, she had me walking a very specific set of instructions, the point of which was not immediately clear. The kata seemed to alternate between calm, stable positions, simulated attacks and blocks, and motions that seemed designed to be interrupted. After she moved me through the kata two times, she fetched a hollow staff from somewhere and had me go through it again.

This time, she used the staff to both adjust my posture where it was wrong (which was, apparently, everywhere) and also to attempt to throw me off balance whenever I was doing acceptably. She narrated her actions constantly, but gave little explanation until, after two more passes at the kata, she called a stop.

"Stillness arts require you to keep your center," she said, as though it should have been obvious. "We will go through the magical exercises in a moment, but you need to cultivate the image that my attacks are no more than a breath of air--that the whole world is still, and will not move as long as you command it to remain still." She raised the staff. "Again. I won't correct your posture this time. If I move at you, it will be to knock you out of your stance."

This time, her pokes and prods with the staff were more like thrusts and ruthless smacks, enough to leave me sore, and her every attack succeeded at knocking me out of my stance. We went through the exercise several more times, which naturally came with no success, but she didn't seem at all phased by that. When I was clearly too messed up to continue, we moved to a meditation phase. This, at least, I did passably, calming down in no more than ten minutes.

"Now," said Ulia as she sat next to me. "You need to be able to circulate Sky Essence through your body. Every essence type has its own pathways through your body, and you should not force it to use another. Breathe," she urged, with a strange bit of emotion in her voice, "and try to feel your body breathing with you. It will not be at the same time, but your flesh and your muscles breathe in and out through your blood. When you breathe in, you will feel that same air reach deep within you, but... moments later. It is there, in that moment of breathing, that you connect all of your flesh to the Sky Essence within you. You must make that connection to use the Wind Arts."

So I struggled, and almost-kinda succeeded, but it felt like all I did was dump what little Sky Essence I had into an empty pit. When I searched for it, there was no sign that I had done anything useful, no sign that I had connected anything.

Ulia, again, wasn't bothered. "Rest," she said. "I will get you some pills, and we will continue. If you can gather essence, that will help, but do not strain yourself."

So I did--I gathered a bit of essence, though again I didn't feel like I was doing much. If anything, I got the impression that the same pathways that Ulia talked about were needed to gather essence, and I could only open them slowly, with effort. That would make sense... in fact, it was more strange that my Spark could use essence freely, as it had done when I fought in the war camp or threw rocks in the fight against the Rakshasa. Was I mixing mundane and godly magic at the time? I hoped not.

In any event, I hoped that whatever pills these were that Ulia was after, they would do a decent job at bringing me back. I was physically and mentally tired out by the morning's exercise, and I still had no small amount of thinking I needed to do; thinking, perhaps, that wouldn't actually help any, but I didn't like the idea of passing the limited time before this mystery deadline too frivolously. If this exercise was going to make that difficult, I might have to back out of it.

I didn't like that idea, either, but hopefully I would have time afterwards to learn what I needed to learn.