Kiersten's Arc

Chapter 28 of 33

Kiersten came to the round room at first light each day after that. Noble set the same bowl on the stone table, then stepped back and watched. Two days shrank to one. One shrank to hours. She trained through every one of them. Noble pulled a small set of books from a low shelf and set them beside the bowl. The covers were worn cloth, stamped with cups and lamps. Vessel books, he called them. Rites for people who carried a spirit inside their skin. "Read the second one first," he said. "Breath. Then blade work. Then the bowl." She read. She breathed the three-six-nine pattern until it sat under her ribs like a second heart. She practiced the guard stances the book drew in faded ink, holding a broom handle where a sword should be. Her arms shook on the first morning. By the second they held. By the third she moved without thinking. Witness moved with her. Kiersten felt the spirit each time she pressed her thumb to the tattoo above her heart — steady, listening, close. She spoke to it while she trained. She named what she wanted out loud, the way her teachers had taught her. I want to stand. I want to strike clean. I want to meet him on my feet. On the fourth morning the bond changed. She was mid-breath, weight low, broom handle raised. A blue light rose under her skin. It ran up her arms and into her chest and behind her eyes. It did not hurt. It filled the empty places the tattoos had unlocked and settled there like water finding its level. She dropped the broom. She looked at her hands. The light pulsed in her palms in time with the count. "Noble," she said. He was already watching. He set down the book he held. "It sealed," he said. "You and the spirit. One thing now." A weight settled at her throat. She reached up. A chain lay against her collarbone that had not been there a breath before. A blue stone hung from it, ringed by thin silver bands that moved when she moved. Witness had given it to her. She knew this the way she knew her own name. Her right hand grew heavy. She looked down. A sword rested in her grip. The blade was blue and clear as deep water, threaded with white light that crackled along the edge. The hilt fit her palm as if it had been made from a cast of it. She raised the sword. The light in her eyes brightened until Noble squinted. She caught her face in the dark glass of the water bowl. Her auburn eyes were gone. Blue as ocean now, lit from behind. "He is one day out," Noble said. "Maybe less." Kiersten lowered the sword and held it at rest. Her hands were steady. She was ready to meet him.