True to his word, he had left Sarraya around sunset and found himself a quiet place to sit and try to regain his power. And it was a disaster. He couldn't concentrate for very long, because every time he did feel himself beginning to come into a meditative state, the eyeless face would assert itself in his mind and disrupt his concentration. He had been afraid of it when it first began to haunt him, but now it was more of an irritation than anything else. It still incited guilt and remorse in him, but now it was keeping him from finding his center again, and that was life-threatening. Without his Sorcery to protect himself from some of the desert's most formidable dangers, he was vulnerable. And he knew it. That knowledge only made his irritation worse, and it was frustrating to have his attempts to calm down and concentrate destroyed by nothing more than a shadow of a dream, something with no substance, something he should not fear in any way. After all, it was simply a face, and nothing more. It could do nothing to him, and yet he still feared it. And that made him even angrier. His pride was injured by that, the Were-cat pride that told him that the strong should not fear the weak.
The outer distractions were one thing, but the single-most overwhelming source of aggravation for him was the Weave itself. It was right there. He could sense it. He could feel it. He could even see it. But no matter what he did, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't find it. It was like fog, or smoke, looking solid from a distance but nothing more than ethereal vapors once it was within reach. The power melted away from him time after time, leaving him grasping nothing but empty air. It reminded him of his initial training, when he struggled under Dolanna's watchful eye to touch the Weave consciously. Before, the thing that had done it for him was to open his eyes, to satisfy his Were need to sense what he was trying to contact. But this time, he could sense it all. In much more detail and clarity than ever before. Yet despite knowing exactly where it was and where to reach, it simply wasn't there.
It was almost as if the Weave didn't want him to touch it.
It was so infuriating! He could see it! He knew where it was, he knew how it felt. But he couldn't come into contact with it! It was almost like he was a ghost, incapable of interacting with the Weave in the same plane. But he knew it was possible, he knew he could do it! The Sha'Kar woman could do it, why couldn't he? It made no sense!
"You knew this was going to happen, Tarrin," Sarraya said from a safe distance. "It's time to calm down and have dinner. You can work yourself into a frenzy tomorrow."
He glared at her.
"Don't give me that look, young man. I'll spank you."
"Shut up," he snapped. Then he dropped himself to the sand. Hard. Almost without thinking about it, he reached within, making contact with the All, and Conjured forth a large honeymelon. He used a single claw to cut the thick outer skin, then split it into two halves. He breathed in and out deeply while he was doing it, a stress-relieving exercise that Allia had taught him at the same time she taught him the trick to ignoring chronic pain. It helped considerably, allowing him to get over his pique, allowed him to bury the frustration and aggravation for a while. He'd stew over it again later, but that was because he needed to do it. He had to analyze his failures so he didn't make the same mistakes, to help him succeed. That was what his mother had taught him, and despite the many changes in his life, the simple lessons given to him by his mother still had more merit than almost anything else he'd learned. He scooped the seeds and core of the melon out with two fingers and claws, casting them to the ground near the rocks. It was bait for later.
"Calm now?" Sarraya asked.
"I'm not throwing this at you, am I?" he retorted.
Sarraya giggled. "No, as a matter of fact, you're not," she agreed, flitting down and landing on the sand before the melon. "Is this mine?"
"If you don't want to conjure your own," he shrugged. "After I eat this, I'm going to see how many mice I can catch."
"Eww," Sarraya said with a shudder. "Don't talk about things like that while I'm eating."
"Don't turn your nose up to it until you try it," he said, taking a bite out of the melon. "Odds are they won't be that tasty, though. They'll probably be as tough and stringy as a ten year old rooster."
"I said not while I'm eating!" Sarraya protested.
He glanced at her, and was about to say something, but another voice suddenly arose from between them. "Tarrin?" Allia's voice called. "Tarrin, are you there?"
Without hesitating, his heart soaring a bit from hearing that voice, Tarrin put a sticky paw on his amulet immediately and willed that she would hear him. "I'm here, Allia," he replied. "What's the matter?"
"Nothing is wrong, but Dolanna wanted me to contact you to make sure you were alright. There have been some… unusual fluctuations in the Weave." Allia had to struggle for words because such a concept was a hard one to phrase in Selani. "She wanted to know if you were feeling the same things."
"What is she saying?" Sarraya asked. Tarrin quickly repeated Allia's words, and Sarraya chuckled. "No wonder. I'm surprised they felt it all the way over there."
"I know what was causing it, sister," Tarrin said. "It's not something I want to say like this. Dolanna warned us that there may be unfriendly ears eavesdropping." He glanced at Sarraya. "Just tell Dolanna that it's nothing to worry about. It shouldn't happen again."
"I'll tell her. How are you, brother? I have worried for you."
"I'm alright, sister," he replied sincerely. "Alot has happened to me, but I'm still here, and I'm still on the move. I miss you."
"It's not right that I'm not there to guide you throught he desert," she said in a surly tone. "I worry about you, because all you have is that flighty Faerie." Allia had to use the Sulasian word for Faerie because no such word existed in Selani.
"What did she say about me?" Sarraya demanded.
"You don't want to know," he told her dismissively. "Where are you, Allia?"
"Right now, we're only a couple of days from Suld," she replied. "We are all well. Most of us are getting very unsettled from being on the ship for so long, but it'll be over soon." There was a pause. "Dolanna is here. She wanted to know if you've been teaching Sarraya the special tongue we use when speaking privately."
Careful, careful Allia. She didn't even want to use the word Sha'Kar, even while speaking Selani through the amulet. It made him wonder why she was speaking Selani. Probably because someone else may be able to hear her on the ship, someone that wasn't a close friend.
"Actually, I haven't," he said, a bit sheepishly. "So much has happened here, sister, that was the last thing I would have thought to do."
"Dolanna says that it is no excuse. Sarraya needs to learn. You have to teach her."
"Alright," he sighed.
"She said my name. What did she say?" Sarraya demanded. "You're getting on my nerves, Tarrin!"
"I'll tell you in a minute!" he snapped at her. "Now shut up and let me talk!" He turned his attention to the amulet again. "Is everyone else alright? Is Dar alright?"