The Talented (13 page)

“
So that you can understand
the accounts and theoretical knowledge that led to the discovery
that people can develop extra-ordinary abilities,” Tam said in a
way that suggested it should have been obvious to her.

“
And why would I believe
this book?” she asked, hefting it doubtfully. “Why should I believe
what you told me? Saying that the stories I heard as a child are
true doesn’t make them so.”

“
You seemed to believe
yesterday.”

“
I listened yesterday,” she
corrected. “And after last night, I don’t know why I should believe
anything you say.”

“
Watch your mouth,” Ilso
snapped.

“
You’d both be dead if not
for me,” she snapped back. “That man last night—”

“
Believing the best of
people does not make me wrong,” Tam said. “I have seen these
abilities with my own eyes. Seen people healed in
instants.”

“
And I’ve seen men swallow
fire and juggle knives,” Adrienne said. “Travelling performers,
nothing more.”

The dream last night had
made such abilities seem momentarily possible, but Tam’s
gullibility when it came to the thief cast a shade of doubt that
she could not dispel.

“
Read the book,” Tam said
again. “I have seen many incredible things. More than just people
being healed. I’ve seen blacksmiths forge unbreakable tools,
scholars able to read and remember in ways I would have thought
impossible.”

“
You told me all of this
yesterday.” And yesterday it has fascinated her. Now it just made
her tired.

“
But I’m not the only one.
These abilities are centuries old. The book describes this, and the
theories behind it all.”

Adrienne felt herself
softening. What if she was wrong? And Kessering was still weeks
away. “Is knowing the theories necessary? At this point in my
training, I mean?”

Tam looked appalled by her
question. “It is essential that you know why myself and the other
scholars came to the conclusions we did about people being able to
learn these abilities. You must understand the process we went
through in making this discovery. If not, how can you understand
why the training is necessary? How can you understand why anyone
needs these abilities at all?”

“
Over the years I have
learned the process of weapon making,” she told Tam, “but I was
able to use weapons long before that, and I understood the purpose
of weapons even earlier.”

“
This matter is hardly as
simple as swordplay,” Tam told her.

The scholar was proving to
be an enigma. In many ways he was extremely intelligent. His
knowledge of history was greater than that of anyone Adrienne had
ever met, and she had even managed to engage him in a philosophical
discussion on the second day that had made their long stop for
lunch pass quickly. But when it came to the subject of soldiers and
fighting, Tam’s opinion that they had little purpose and were
hardly more than dumb brutes was proving unshakeable.

Adrienne considered
defending the intricate nature of swordsmanship to Tam, but she
didn’t waste her breath. Tam did not respect anything but knowledge
gained from books. “I can see the differences,” Adrienne said
sardonically.

“
I realize the mental
activity of reading such an old book might be difficult for you,
but it is necessary.” Tam muttered something more under his breath,
but the only word Adrienne caught was “translation.”

“
What language was this
originally written in?” Adrienne asked.

“
Old Samaroan,” Tam said.
“I believe the knowledge to be more apparent in the original, but
few besides scholars now know more than a couple words of Old
Samaroan, so we must content ourselves with the
translation.”

“
I know Old Samaroan,”
Adrienne said. She still wasn’t sure why she needed to read this
book on theory herself, instead of Tam teaching her the pertinent
details, but she would show him that she was not stupid. “Mental
activity” was not beyond her.

“
You do?”

Adrienne nodded and
explained how she had come to learn the language when she was just
a child. Her explanation was delivered in Old Samaroan, perfect but
for a rather rough accent. “I would like to use the translation as
a reference,” she said in the common tongue, “but if you have a
copy of the original, I would prefer to work with that.”

Tam looked confused. His
response was slow, as if he did not know what to do with the new
information. “Ah, yes, I did bring a copy of the original text,
though I intended it for my own study.” He frowned. “Are you sure
you know enough of the language for the book to be
useful?”

“
Yes.”

Tam nodded, then turned to
search one of his numerous bags for the book. As he searched his
movements became quicker and a smile spread across his face.
Whatever doubts he’d had about her, it seemed that the new
information had replaced them, at least for the moment. “If you
really can read and understand Old Samaroan, I believe this will
give you a tremendous advantage.” He handed the book over and
rubbed his hands together eagerly. “This is marvelous.
Incredible.”

He smiled at her, and
there was no reserve in it. Adrienne thought for the first time
that Tam’s attitude toward her might not have been intentionally
harsh. Unlike Ilso, whose dislike of soldiers seemed real and well
developed, Adrienne realized that she could very well be the first
soldier Tam had ever been in close and sustained contact with. With
no real frame of reference, and with Ilso as his companion, it
could be that he had no way to relate to her.

“
I’d like to talk to you
about it tonight,” Adrienne said. She still wasn’t sure if she
believed him, but there was no reason to antagonize him, or to try
and understand the book alone.

“
Of course, of course,” Tam
said, rubbing his hands together. “Of course.”

Adrienne left and wandered
over to the top of a low hill to begin her studies. Since there was
no shade to be found, a view and the chance of a breeze seemed the
best choice. After an hour of exhaustive reading she was
disheartened to see that she had made only minimal progress. Her
only consolation was that the translation was as difficult to
understand as the original text written in Old Samaroan. The book
had not been written as a manual on theory, as she had supposed, or
as instruction on how to develop and use the amazing abilities Tam
had told her about. Rather, it was a journal written by an
unidentified person—Adrienne thought it was probably a man, but
that was only a guess—and abilities such as those Tam had spoken of
were often mentioned only obliquely, and rarely in a positive
light.

Those who use these
unnatural means generally behave as though they are superior to
their natural brethren. These people speak of a ‘connection with
the universe’ while simultaneously committing acts that go against
the natural laws of the universe. Their high-handedness affronts
more pragmatic individuals with true and natural concerns. These
people will no doubt lead us into anarchy given the
opportunity.

There were some words in
the journal that Adrienne needed the translation for, and she hoped
that no important nuances were getting lost. She could not be sure
how good the translation was, or how the informal nature of a
journal might be coloring the reality of the abilities it spoke
of.

Many passages in the
journal gave incredible insights into the author’s desultory
nature, in Adrienne’s opinion, but little insight into the people
who could do these “unnatural” things, and even less about what
those things were. They did serve to make Adrienne more curious
about the people the author was referring to, however, and she
became even more grateful that Karse had taught her Old Samaroan in
an attempt to entertain the young girl who had been left primarily
in his care.

She had learned that
reading Old Samaroan was easier when she fully immersed herself in
the reality of the text. As she spent more time reading the
journal, Adrienne began to understand why Tam and the commission
referred to the people in the book as Talented. How else could she
describe people with such amazing abilities, such
Talents?

“
Connection with the
universe” sounded like some of Tam’s theoretical knowledge, and
Adrienne wondered why the Talented thought they were more closely
connected than others. And if they truly were more connected, how
did they gain that connection? Was it inborn, or something
learned?

Adrienne wished more of
the journal was focused on the Talented, rather than chronicling
the author’s days and beliefs.

After the report of riots
to the south came in, there was debate about what the response
should be. Some are calling for a military response to preempt an
act of rebellion. This show of strength, as some are calling it,
might suit the brutish minds of some, but those fools do not
understand the real issues. These times require a government led by
the enlightened, not by men who think that swords will solve every
problem.

If Adrienne had not read
his previous entry, she might have been sympathetic to his beliefs,
but the “riot” he described had resulted in twenty-one people dead
and dozens more injured. His dogmatic beliefs about an “enlightened
government” over a military-and-defense minded one were terribly
naive.

From what she gathered,
the journal had been written before the conflict with Almet. Before
the rule of the Fuirons, even, as the author referred to slaves as
a part of everyday life. An acceptable part of everyday life. He
seemed to have no compunction about punishing his own slaves, even
going so far as to write down the punishment he had administered to
one of his male slaves.

Yesterday I gave Barimbo
twenty lashes for disobedience. He had brought food to one of the
women when I had forbidden her to be fed for two days.

Today, a boy came to me
telling me Barimbo was too sick to work. I went to his shack myself
and pulled him out of bed. There is a plot to be turned, and
Barimbo is the strongest of my slaves. If he had wanted to avoid a
fever, he should never have made me whip him. I will not allow him
to get out of work as a result of his disobedience, or I’ve no
doubt he will grow more disobedient in future.

It does not do to show
slaves tenderness. To do that is to encourage them to be lax in
their duties.

The accounts of his
treatment of slaves made her shudder. Adrienne could not imagine
such treatment of a human being as legal, yet she knew that that
and worse had been done regularly before the Fuirons came to power.
And it was happening even now in Almet.

After reading two tedious
pages about the author’s mother, whose authoritarian character was
“unenlightened” and “unbecoming of an educated woman,” Adrienne set
the book aside in disgust. It was a waste of time, reading drivel
about a long-dead someone’s longer-dead parent, but she couldn’t
risk missing some mention of the Talented. She had so little to go
on at present that any mention of them could be important, and the
author had more than once scrambled his rants about his parent or
the government in with his rants against the “unnatural
creatures.”

It was only late
afternoon, but they had already set up camp for the night. Adrienne
could not object to the campsite, as it was well situated on a hill
near a quick-flowing stream, but as usual she thought they could
have pressed on for a couple more hours.

Adrienne did not complain
about the early stop; she was grateful to put an end to their
travel that day. It had been two days since she had gotten any
exercise, and she thought a run and an hour of stretching and
balancing poses would help clear her head and prepare her for
reading more of the journal. Too much reading and too little
activity besides sedately riding Strider were making her itchy and
moody. Without some release, she thought she might turn on her
companions in hopes of some excitement.

“
I am going for a run,”
Adrienne informed Ilso and Tam. “I should be back in half an
hour.”

“
What?” Tam asked,
regarding her as he would a curiosity. It was his usual response
whenever Adrienne pursued any physical activity without need. Even
volunteering to collect extra fuel for the fire could be perceived
as strange by the man. He preferred studying to all else, which was
no doubt the cause of the fat paunch around his middle.

“
I won’t hold supper,” Ilso
warned.

“
I enjoy the exercise,”
Adrienne explained to Tam, ignoring Ilso’s warning. With a parting
look she headed downriver at an easy lope, enjoying the feel of her
muscles and ligaments flexing and relaxing with the familiar
motions. A feeling of peace such as she had not felt since leaving
Kyrog filled her as her mind cleared and she fell into a natural
rhythm. There were trees lining the stream, and a breeze relieved
some of the sweltering heat.

The only sign Adrienne saw
of other people was the remains of a fire at least two days old.
She would keep an eye out, but she was not overly concerned by what
she saw. Whoever had been camping near the river two days ago would
be several leagues away now, even traveling by foot.