Chapter 7 - Part 5

Iron Orphan saw the halfling woman arrive shortly before dawn. He was on the ledge around the room, staring at the eastern sky. With little to do other than exercise and train, one of his secret delights was in watching the sky every morning change color, until the whole horizon light up right before the sun’s might appeared.

He was there, watching the stars on the other side of the hardened glass, waiting for them to fade, when he first noticed the pony. There were torches on tall poles at the eastern entrance to the manor, shedding light down onto the turnoff from the road. The manor did not have a wall around it, but the land around it had been reworked so that anyone approaching would have to go up a steep slope in an area devoid of cover, without a tree or a bush. Only three approaches had a graded road that allowed for easy travel, and all three had illumination, archers, and gongs. The light was enough for him to see the rider even over the buildings that partially obstructed his view.

The pony seemed small, and its rider no more than a child. At what Orphan presumed to be a challenge from the guards, the rider threw her hood back. Iron Orphan squinted. It was hard to be sure, but it seemed the rider had an adult manner. He suspected that this was the halfling, arrived early. He wondered why she came without retinue, and why she rode a pony instead of a dinosaur. The books he had read had spoken of the large lizards with great trepidation.

The halfling woman dismounted, and they led her into the manor area proper. The other buildings cut his view off, so he was left to watch the sky and wonder if Lo’Paih was already awake or would be woken up.

The stars began to fade before the arriving light, and he mused at the eternal contest between day and night. As he often did he wondered why there were so many moons, but only one sun.

Within time the whole eastern sky was light up from end to end, and he lost himself in the beauty that was the world. He felt like an excited child as he awaited the sunrise, that first moment when the orb that was too bright to be clearly seen broke free to conquer and rule the day.

He heard multiple footsteps approaching the building and he felt irritation. So excited was Lo’Paih – and it was her, he knew her footsteps – that she was bringing this Madam Visha now. Now, when he wanted to see the sunrise. Every sunrise was different, as far as he was concerned, each a different instant that his mind sought to capture. And the ambitious Lo’Paih, so eager to prove to her uncle that she could and should command more of Cannith’s resources, was barely even pacing her stride to allow Madam Visha to keep up. It sounded as if she hadn’t even put on her ever-present armor correctly.

The door was opened quickly and loudly. “Warforged!” Lo’Paih called.

“Hush!” he called down irritated. A stunned silence followed, punctuated by a snicker that some Cannith servant would later regret not suppressing.

“Iron Orphan,” Lo’Paih said with a transparently false patience. “Get down here.”

He ignored her, watching the horizon, even as she drew a sword.

“Don’t make me come up there,” she said, her voice strained. He had embarrassed her.

“Wait,” he told her. His answer was booted feet on floor and then the stairs, charging at him.

There! The flash came, the reaching rays of the sun, the triumph of life and strength! He saw it, and let a tension from his mouth leave, the warforged equivalent of a smile.

His enjoyment was a second as he spun and grabbed her wrist, preventing her sword from touching him. Her face was beet-red, and her eyes promised punishment. He yanked back on her arm and spun her ninety degrees. He suspected that she may actually be stronger than he was – he really didn’t know, but the first part of his programming dealing with wrestling that he recalled had been about leverage and balance being far more important than strength. He had both, she had neither. Before she could recover and gain that balance he had placed a foot into the center of her chest and kicked her off the ledge.

She fell backwards, maintaining her grip on her sword even after she hit. It took a second if that to land on the floor. Her armor took the worst of it, and the mat prevented serious injury, but she was winded and stunned. Before she could recover he had leaped down, landing astride her, and kicked the sword away. She struggled to get it, but he put a forearm against her soft windpipe, pinning her. He was aware of the other Cannith people scrambling for weapons.

“I was watching the sunrise,” he told her deliberately. “You almost spoiled it for me.”

“You. Will. Regret. This.” Her words were barely constrained things, shrieking whirlwinds of anger and humiliation that were bound by sounds which managed to be recognizable speech by the slimmest of margins.

“Ask yourself who is worth more to your uncle right now,” he told her. “You or me.” He pressed his arm on her neck briefly, then let it up. “Come at me with a weapon in your hand again and you will die.”

He got off of her and walked away, deliberately turning his back on her. The two Cannith retainers were holding their halberds at the ready, but did not seem to want to engage him. That was fine with him, his attention was not on them anyway.

The halfling that he had been told was called Madam Visha regarding him passively, he face untouched by any concern or worry. There was perhaps a trace of curiosity to her, but it was held in check. She did not seem to be even three feet in height, although her slight, lined face was that of a woman who had been a great beauty at one time. Her hair was almost completely white, and neatly tied back from her face by a leather cord that had been dyed a green and tan pattern. Her clothes were hand-made cotton and leather, with soft, nondescript colors in an almost-pattern. She wore no weapons that he could see, although he spotted several hidden pockets, and her only other accouterment was a necklace made of a silver-colored thread that contained several polished reptilian teeth.

“You have been training with a student of the Mockery,” she observed. “Your blocks are aggressive, and use more effort than is required.”

“I wasn’t given a choice of who to train with,” he told her.

She nodded. “Nor was I,” she said. “I am surprised to see one of your kind doing this training, no offense is meant.”

“None is taken,” he said. Something about her reminded him of Pienna. He liked her. He hoped that he was not mistaken.

“You – you will address her by her proper title!” Lo’Paih demanded, now having gotten up and grabbed her sword. She seemed to trying to regain some authority.

He turned back and looked at her sword. She stared at him and swallowed. She then sheathed it, trying to pretend like it was her own idea.

He returned his attention to the halfling. “Forgive me, Madam Visha, I shall respect your title.”

“My title is not Madam,” Visha said as she took her traveling cloak off. “That is a human misconception and mistranslation.” She hung her cloak on a peg. “Let us begin as soon as we are alone.”

“No,” Lo’Paih said. “We always have an artificer in here and some security in case the warforged misbehaves.”

“Funny, I don’t see an artificer in here now,” Visha said. Lo’Paih turned even redder. “Young lady, this arrangement was made by my brother and your uncle, you have no say in the arrangements. If I am to train this…” she paused, searching for the right term. “This individual, I am to train in my fashion. These are private methods. Take your retainers and go.”

Lo’Paih sputtered and began to argue, but the halfling woman merely folded her arms and waited, neither answering nor responding. Lo’Paih threatened, Lo’Paih promised, Lo’Paih demanded, and Lo’Paih swore, but Visha ignored her utterly, not saying a word. Finally the young Cannith woman took her temper out on her retainers, screaming at them to get out of Visha’s way. The three humans left as Lo’Paih viciously stabbed the dragonshard on her gauntlet with her finger. The doors slammed shut, leaving the warforged and the halfling alone.

“She’s not going to open those doors again until nightfall,” Iron Orphan warned the halfling. “She’ll make you go hungry, regret crossing her.”

“I can get out of this building whenever I wish,” she told him. “And I have my own provisions.” She walked to the center of the room and turned to face him. “We begin your first lesson. Come here, please.”

Intrigued, he came over and stood a few feet from her. “Forgive my ignorance,” she said. “But I do not know how you wish to be referred to. Are you a he, a she, or an it?”

“I am metaphorically a he, but that is really more a reflection of personality than anything else,” he told her. “I was branded with a number when they forged me, as they do to all of their warforged, but I named myself and I refuse to answer to the number they burned onto me.” He touched his now-smooth shoulder. “They have since removed their brand so as to make me less traceable, but I refuse to answer to anything other than my name.”

“Which would be what?” she asked, a twinkle in her eye.

“Oh,” he said, feeling foolish. “I call myself Iron Orphan, or sometimes just Orphan.”

“I am Visha, daughter of the Three-Trees clan, First Student of the Balanced Palm, and your sensei.”

“What is a sensei?” he asked her.

“A mentor, a teacher, and a guide,” she told him. “All of my students address me as Sensei Visha or just sensei. Now pay attention.” She did a short half-bow while she kept her eyes on his eyes. “That is the proper introductory bow before training. It shows that you respect your opponent, but that you do not take eyes off of him or her. The student is supposed to bow first, and greet the sensei, and then the sensei bows and greets the student. Two or more students will bow together and say ‘Peace be upon you, sensei.’ The sensei then responds ‘Peace be upon you, children of the Balanced Palm.’ For one student, the greeting is ‘Peace be upon us, sensei.’ Then the sensei responds ‘Ours is the peace of the Balanced Palm, my student.’ Do you understand?”

The warforged nodded. Slowly and deliberately he copied her bow. “Peace be upon us, sensei.”

She bowed back. “Ours is the peace of the Balanced Palm, my student.” She gave him a small smile. “You learn quickly.”

“Thank you, sensei.”

“These rituals are important, and I am glad to see that you treat them so. The Mockery laugh at anything that is not strength, and theirs is the path of rigid aggression. The Balanced Palm is the way of conquering the self so as to serve others. Some are served with protection, some are served with labor, and some are served by having their evil beaten from them. We do not seek revenge or grudges, we seek to give the best service. The best service to a wicked soul is to prevent it from another further wickedness. Sometimes this is done with a beating, sometimes a maiming, and sometimes, unfortunately, a killing. Do you comprehend this?”

“Yes,” he said. “But meaning no disrespect, sensei, it seems to be a justification.”

“It seems to be, yes,” she told him. “The Mockery laughs that it is so, the courts of the Five Kingdoms dismiss it as so, and the ignorant label it so. But its strength is that it is true, so long as the student applies it wholly. A student of the Balanced Palm would regret having to disarm Lo’Paih, would do it efficiently, but dispassionately. As a gardener weeds and a surgeon cuts away gangrenous flesh, so to do we battle those who are forced by their own actions to be our enemies. We do not seek enemies, we avoid harming others if their actions allow us to.”

He nodded. “I think I understand. What would you have done to Lo’Paih?”

“I would have not said ‘Hush,’ or some similar blunt word,” she told him. “Rather something like ‘Your Pardon, I observe the dawn.’”

“I do not seek her pardon,” Iron Orphan said, trying to not snap at the halfling. “I care nothing for her permission.”

She laughed, but not meanly. “You have an adult’s mind but a child’s understanding. We are not polite to others for their sake, Orphan, we do it for our sake. A student of the Balanced Palm does not say ‘Come at me with a weapon in your hand again and you will die.’ Instead the student says ‘I regret that due to your demonstrated inclinations and your expertise with your weapon I will be force to end your life should you approach me with the weapon drawn.’ And what’s more the student will mean it.”

“The student means the regret or the student means that they will end the enemy’s life?” he asked.

“Both,” she told him. “That is the balance. To regret the action, but be able to perform it skillfully and without hesitation.”

“That seems impossible, sensei,” he said doubtfully.

“It is not easy,” she said. “But it is within your grasp. It is within the palm of your hand.”

“Ah,” he responded, comprehending the meaning of her order’s name. “Well, I shall attempt it.”

“No, Orphan,” she told him, a touch of sadness in her voice. “You must succeed, else a great darkness will cover this world that will make this terrible war seem like a recreational trip to the watering hole.”

“What are you talking about?” he asked. She raised her eyebrow. “What are you talking about, sensei?” he asked again, correcting himself.

“A prophecy, my student,” she said. “I cannot elaborate more, for I myself do not know more except for ways and means that I am sworn not to reveal.” She clapped her hands. “Attend, for we begin! Let us find the places where our souls intuitively sense disruption, and then we can spar…”