He handed me a white blindfold.
'More darkness?'
'No. That's to protect your eyes from the glare. Anyone who's nanite-enhanced can step up hearing and sight in normal darkness. It's harder under intense heat and light.' He offered a lazy smile I distrusted. 'You'll see.'
From somewhere he produced a wooden wand, then a second, which he extended to me. 'You'll never need to use a weapon, but this is easier on you to begin with. Put on the blindfold.'
After having seen him in action twice, I had no doubts about that. Once the blindfold was on and I held the wand loosely in my right hand, I could feel heat - and a blinding light that stabbed my eyes, even through the blindfold.
'I'm going to tap you gently and at odd intervals. I want you to concentrate on trying to use your senses besides your eyes to feel out where I am. Just try to sense where I am.'
'Yes, ser.'
He laughed. 'Tomas is fine.' He tapped my left shoulder, and I tried to gather a sensory picture of where he was.
Another tap went to my right thigh. I couldn't hear anything but the faint susurration of his breathing. Where did it come from? Another tap to my left shin.
'Can you sense me?'
With the voice, I located him immediately. One point four meters, forty-three relative.
Another tap, this time to the back of my upper right arm.
I concentrated. Point nine meters, one forty-three. An impact harder than a mere tap - to my left shoulder blade.
One point one meters, two zero-one.
'Now ... try to face me as I move. If you don't follow me, I'm going to tap you harder.'
The first tap was to the wand I held, and with the vibrations I could turn to face Tomas, but his 'image' faded, lost in the glare and the heat that poured down on me. I caught a whiff of sweat, acrid, not mine, but could not locate it.
Tap! The back of my left wrist stung.
Too many taps landed, despite my intermittent success in trying to keep Tomas before me, for all too many times I did not anticipate or sense his reversals of direction.
'That's enough,' Tomas said. The glare faded. 'You can take off the blindfold.'
I pulled off the damp white band, my eyes on Tomas. His face was damp, somewhat sweaty. My singlesuit was soaked - again, and I stunk of frustration and apprehension.
'You're getting the feel for it. Learning to read your body's signals is hard. Most demons never go beyond sharper eyesight and listening in darkness. I'll see you tomorrow.'
He picked up the fulgent blades from somewhere and began to juggle them, his eyes closed.
I hoped Tomas was right. I had small welts everywhere on my body when I left the gymnasium, welts that once would have been solid bruises - and would be again if I didn't learn faster.
62
Visions are born and die in those who behold them.
On sevenday, Cerrelle was actually waiting when I stepped out onto the glider platform in the depths beneath Lyncol. Instead of a singlesuit, she wore blue trousers and a shimmering white shirt under a sky-gray coat that looked to be wool.
'It's good to see you.' I couldn't help smiling as I saw her, as the handful of other passengers eased around us and toward the steps.
She answered my words with a smile.
'This is the first time I've seen you in something that wasn't an official singlesuit.' I switched the duffel to my left hand, and we walked up the polished stone steps together.
'There has to be a first time for everything.' She paused. 'Are you hungry?'
'I've never not been hungry since I came to Rykasha. Where do you want to go?'
'Me, either. The Overlook is close, and it wasn't full when I walked by.'
'That would be good.'
At the top of the steps, I opened the door, and we stepped into a cold and clear day, a sky bright blue without a trace of clouds. The rain that had fallen in Runswi had been snow in Lyncol, and the piles that flanked the path were more than head high as we walked downhill and toward the Overlook. In the light breeze, snow sifted across the top of the piled snow and onto the path, where it promptly melted - or was melted by some nanite magic. The tops of the pines swayed ever so slightly, and powdery snow sifted through the needles and sprayed in minute clouds across the lane to the Overlook.
Cerrelle held the door for me. 'More people than when I came by earlier.'
The tables in the center of the wide glass windows were taken, and we sat at the last one at the south end of the glass. Cerrelle's face was pale.
'You need something to eat,' I said. 'Go get it. I'll hold the table.'
'Just leave your jacket. No one will take it.'
Given the honesty, enforced or otherwise, of the Rykashans, she was right. I had to frown as I followed her. I could have done the same in Dorcha. Was there a certain skepticism programmed into us genetically that came out when we didn't think? What else showed up when we reacted? I wasn't sure I wanted to know.
Cerrelle was loading her tray while I was still looking over the limited menu, finally settling on Chicken Mettersfel, flattened and breaded chicken sauteed in wine and smothered with truffles. It came with grass rice and mixed greens.
Cerrelle was waiting as I returned to the table.
'Eat,' I told her, 'before you collapse.'
That brought a smile, and she did lift her fork. I sipped some of the Arleen and glanced out the window. The mounds of snow that flanked the frozen and snow-drifted pool looked lower, until I realized that windblown snow had filled in the hollows. Little swirls chased each other in the intermittent brisk wind beyond the glass. The heat of the hearth warmed my right shoulder.
After several mouthfuls of her roast lamb, Cerrelle looked up. 'How are you doing?'
'As they expect, I think. If I weren't, I'd have gotten some indication.' I cut some of the herbed chicken and chewed it and some hard cracker bread with sesame seeds fried into it.
'You're learning. I told you you'd be good at it'
'You don't mind my coming for just a few hours?' Outside, the wind picked up and whipped fine snow powder against the window.
'It's better than not coming at all' Her face remained sober, but there was a smile in her eyes, one I wouldn't have seen a year earlier.
'I'm glad you feel that way.'
'You were the one who didn't feel that way on OE Station,' she reminded me. I winced.
'Tyndel... I may forgive, but I don't forget' She softened the words with a half grin, half smile. 'Best I not forget that.'
'You have some bruises. There's one on your neck.'
'Your friend Tomas. He's taken over my physical training.'
Cerrelle winced. 'I'm sorry.'
She was sorry. Her voice and the tension behind it indicated that as well. I thought for a moment. 'It would take me years, dozens of years, to match his skills. Where do they send pilots that's so dangerous, and why did they pick me? Because I was so difficult and I owe more?'
She shook her head. 'It's not that - not the owed balance. The Rykasha are honest. You worked off three years' worth out of fifteen. A bit less than fifteen for OE Station. That leaves you with six or seven years to make up at a Web jockey's rate. Your training doesn't work off time, but it doesn't count for more time, either. Some training does.' The redhead across the table from me sipped the last of the amber liquid in the tall beaker.