She was watching him now, interest a soft blue flicker of flame in her gaze
“How did you cope with what you were? What you can do…I don’t even know myself anymore, I was happy…And now I feel so lost, lost in the mists I’m supposed to become a controller of. My gift controls me, Sir…It scares me more than those who sought to kill me.”
There was a shiver of strength to the set of her shoulders now, the tall man so much more than the boys in her class, she didn’t have to stoop to talk to him, ad she was slowly learning that.
“I don’t want to hate myself anymore, Mireya told me I had to work to avenge the evil done against the good, but what if the evil sees me as evil and themselves as good…It is all a grey mist, things were simple on the farm with Ma and Father.”
Anrui just… Smiled.
“Good and evil are perspectives.” The pale man shrugged, lifting his hands uselessly. “It’s hard to say what the Dornans and the Xul think. They attacked first, many years ago, and we’ve been fighting a slowly losing battle, ever since the Saervan Beach engagement when the Grey Man disappeared twenty years ago. I think I was only about three then.” Anrui shook his head, looking back out over the ocean.
“You need to find your own reason to fight. Everyone has one. Everyone has their own way. Mine is through battle. Some turn the path of the Healers, though there is danger in that as well. Some become assassins. Some, artisans, shaping armour and weapons for the mundane soldiers in Wyvern Lake. You’ll find your own path. Just hope you do before one is forced upon you by the Divine.”
“War, does it serve a purpose for the gods, or is it a purpose for men?” The girl had obviously been spending much time asking questions that would not have answers, a keen intelligence behind the slovenly reticence that many had taken for backwater stupidity. “How do I find my path, Sir? Being a healer sounds nice…Until I think of the wounded, the dying, the helplessness that comes with having to watch young men become young corpses….They are so calm, and I feel like there’s a storm broiling in my head….Will you teach us what we could become? How do you teach something you yourself have said is so personal
“That’s part of my trouble.” He frowned, crossing his arms against the cool breeze. “I’m not cut out for this teaching thing. I’m a field agent. An assassin. It’s a harsh job, but it’s what my talents play to. It’s definitely not what I want, but what I want often doesn’t enter into the matter. And now that I’ve been made Arbiter…”
He shook his head.
“I can tell you about the professions. The paths in the mage forces. But we won’t have time for that yet. There’s so much work to do.” This last was said like a mantra for Frost’s entire life. So much work to do. A sad vector to a brilliant Weaver’s thoughts, but perhaps the only thing keeping him in line. This was a man who existed for Duty. Honour. Courage. There was clearly little else of value in his life.
About Ian
