Book I of III: The Swords of the Sultan (10 page)

Though the drill instructor made it appear as
if he was yawning and stretching, what he was really doing was
covertly looking over in the direction that his student’s head
indicated.

After completing his stretches about ten
seconds later, he stopped, turned back to face his student, and
asked with a bit of surprise, “Thesmul?”

“Yes, sir,” Baltor muttered, while
unconsciously averting his eyes; he saw that Thesmul had already
reached the lunch table, picked up a loaf of bread, and was about
to take a bite into it.

Though the drill instructor didn’t understand
the curiosity that his student for this other student, he quickly
drew Baltor’s mind back to reality by snapping his fingers once
next to his ear, and saying, “Baltor.”

A bit startled, the boy turned his head and
eyes to look at his drill instructor, and then he asked in a loud
tone of voice, “Yes, sir?”

As soon as Humonus saw that he and his
student were looking each other eye to eye, he said in a caring
tone of voice, “I know what it’s like to lose someone that you care
about—believe me. I also know that I may sound like a hard-ass, but
that is because it is my job to toughen you up. I have lost a
couple students in the past that I believed to have potential, but
really, they had already given up long before they ever met
me.”

For the next ten seconds, the drill
instructor silently observed not only the sadness, fear, and grief
reflected in his student’s eyes, yet the squinting eyebrows and
eyes that indicated his student was contemplating his words.

Taking advantage of the silence that had
lasted eleven seconds,

Humonus continued, “Baltor, I have two
questions for you to ponder, which is really one question, but
answer neither of them now...”

After taking a deep breath in through his
mouth, he asked, “Are you going to focus upon the people that are
lost, and shall always remain that way no matter what you do or
say? Or are you going to focus upon the people that have hope and
are looking for a new and better way no matter what?”

Baltor looked toward the ground in dismay, as
he asked, “Sir, how am I supposed to know who has hope and who
doesn’t?”

“Your heart will tell you that,” Humonus
answered. With his index finger and thumb, he gently lifted the
boy’s chin until they were looking eye to eye yet again and added,
“and also your mind.”

“But, sir, you’ve already told me twice that
I knew where I could go should I give up! How can you call that
caring?” Baltor dared to ask.

Humonus stepped back a couple steps, extended
his hands and arms out in front of him, and answered very, very
seriously, “I’ve known all along that you wouldn’t jump into the
pit and kill yourself!”

“But what do your feelings tell you about
Vakshia?” the boy asked with quite a bit of frustration. Without
waiting for an answer, he added, “My heart told me that Vakshia
would surely make it as a master thief, and now she’s probably
dead!”

“Ah,” the drill instructor said with an
affirming nod to his head. “That is why there must be the
defenders, so long as there are the oppressors.”

Lowering his voice until it was just a
whisper, the boy asked, “So, do you think she was murdered?”

Upon hearing that unexpected question,
Humonus sucked in a deep breath while simultaneously raising both
eyebrows. Instead of answering the question on that particular
breath, however, he exhaled, and then breathed in deeply yet
again.

He finally whispered, “It appears that you
have a mystery that must be solved, but not now. In my professional
opinion, you are not even close to being ready to begin this
quest.”

Baltor whispered, a bit louder and with angry
tones, “Sir, the longer we wait, the harder it will be to find out
the truth. Then if she was murdered, we will never find the
killer—”

With a wag of his finger, Humonus interrupted
in a commanding but not a loud tone of voice, “Silence—do not say
another word until I give you permission, my student. That is an
order.”

Baltor turned silent, though he was clearly
upset.

The drill instructor said evenly, “This may
be your personal quest, but it is not mine. My quest, my mission,
my job, which is how I get paid to live, is to train you—not to try
and look for evidence to determine if another student’s
disappearance was murder, or most likely, suicide.”

After giving the boy a lengthy pause to let
the important info sink in, he continued, “After all, most of the
underground pits around the obstacle courses, and throughout all
the tunnels, are truly bottomless, and how easy it is to have an
accidental suicide? On the other hand, maybe it was an intentional
suicide. Who knows?

“No matter what, I cannot permit this,
because the High Council has already concluded that there is
not
to be an investigation in the matter. And the High
Council has the
final
say-so
in all things related to
the Guild.”

He first put his right hand on Baltor’s right
shoulder, before he said softly, “Just so you know that I’m
sympathetic to your cause, after you’ve completed your training
with me, then go ahead and complete your quest, but I order you not
to do it now—you’re simply not ready.”

The boy remained silent, even though he
obviously had wished to speak the whole time.

The drill instructor began squeezing his
student’s shoulder for emphasis as he added, “I know that I’ve said
a lot already, but I have one more thing to point out before we get
back to training—okay? Nod your head in the affirmative if you’ve
understood all I’ve said so far.”

The boy nodded his head.

Humonus took his left hand off Baltor’s
shoulder but then extended that index finger in front of him while
the remaining fingers clenched into a fist.

A moment later he added, “Good—let’s
hypothesize that you decide to disobey my order, become successful
in finding Vakshia in the nearby future, discover that she was
indeed murdered, track down the murderer, and try to face him, or
her or them, on your own. Most likely, all I’ve taught you will go
to waste, as you’ll become the next missing victim. So do not
disobey me, understand? Now you can speak.”

The boy’s eyes disappointingly looked to the
ground, but he dutifully responded, “Yes, sir.”

Using that extended index finger, Humonus
again lifted up Baltor’s chin until they were eye to eye for the
third time, and then he gently concluded, “Listen—all things will
reveal themselves, if Destiny, Fate and God decree it.”

“Yes, sir,” the boy said, while holding the
gaze firmly with his drill instructor.

A couple seconds later, Humonus let go of
Baltor’s chin, just before taking two steps back, and then crossing
his arms.

Upon observing that the student still looked
calm and serene, nearly ten seconds later, the drill instructor
ordered, “Go ahead and take your lunch break. Meet me back here in
a half an hour.” Without pause, he started walking with a very
quick stride toward the tunnel that led into the fountain room.

Meanwhile, Baltor looked back over to the
lunch table, noticing that Thesmul was nowhere around there, nor
was he anywhere else in the cavern at all, as he soon became aware
of.

He casually made his way over to the lunch
table. Once there, he wolfed down a large lunch that consisted of
four loaves of wheat bread and two delicious red oranges, and then
proceeded to wash it down with a whole mug of water.

By the time that he had finished eating,
fifteen minutes later, he took a seat against the wall in the
training area and waited and relaxed. Fifteen minutes later, he
observed Humonus come back from whence he left, and so Baltor stood
to his feet.

Upon arrival, the drill instructor began,
“Baltor, as I was trying to instruct right before lunch, every
weapon must be nothing more than an extension of your own body, and
every attack or defense begins and ends within the confines of your
basic stance, regardless of the size of the weapon or weapons you
may happen to be carrying.”

He pulled the daggers out of his belt. As he
held a dagger in each hand with the blade extended out, he said,
“From the four stylized punches that I taught you earlier, you can
incorporate weapons into your movements just as easily.”

He then demonstrated all four of the punches
while holding the daggers. Upon completion, he asked, “Do you see
what I mean?”

Baltor’s eyes squinted in contemplation for a
moment, before his mouth answered, “Yes, sir.”

The drill instructor swiftly flipped the
daggers around until the handles were facing his pupil, and then he
said, “Good—now you try them.”

The boy, after taking the daggers, attempted
the four different punches with a dagger in each hand.

“Not bad,” Humonus informed with a single nod
to his head, “but you will need to practice this much more often,
especially if you are to become fluidic like water.”

“Yes, sir!”

“Now to the defensive rolls while in
possession of weapons—hand me back the daggers,” the drill
instructor ordered.

After Baltor had clumsily twisted the daggers
around until the handles faced out, Humonus took them.

The drill instructor next taught, “A strong
defense is just as important as a strong offense. You must be
extremely careful while practicing your rolls not to let the weapon
or weapons touch the ground, or you will lose one or both weapons,
and possibly even seriously injure yourself in the process. Simply
watch my movements and you will see what I mean about how to do
things right.”

He leapt forward and after ensuring that the
daggers were parallel with the ground so that they did not contact,
he rolled back onto his feet and assumed the ready stance. The
daggers were still in his hand.

He next leapt to the right while extending
his arms that way, paralleled the daggers with the ground and
rolled back onto his feet. Just like before, the daggers were in
his hands and he was in the ready position.

He fell backward while extending his arms
out, but before his hands slapped the ground, he had already
paralleled the daggers with the ground so they did not contact, and
then he rolled himself back over onto his feet—in the ready
position.

Baltor look on in amazement.

Humonus swiftly flipped the daggers around in
his hands, and then handed Baltor the handles. He ordered, “Now you
try…roll forward.”

Baltor leapt forward and extended his hands
out. He tried to keep the daggers from contacting the ground, but
failed. Though he rolled back onto his feet, he was now disarmed
from both weapons.

“Try again.”

“Yes, sir!”

Over the course of the next week during the
mornings, the boy practiced these very movements under his drill
instructor’s tutelage, all the while holding onto weapons of all
sorts. During the afternoons until late a night, he practiced on
his own, all the while trying to unite these new movements with his
other learned skills. And all the while, he slowly-but-surely got
better and better.

Ever so secretly, in the wee morning hours
when everyone else was asleep, Baltor had begun to investigate into
the disappearance of Vakshia, whether dead or alive, despite the
orders and warnings.

After sneaking into the supply room for the
very first time, he had found a coiled one-hundred-foot rope in a
large and very dusty sack, and just as useful, a large wood box
containing two-dozen torches and some flint.

For no longer than two hours each time, he
would check the chasms, pits, and deep gorges around the obstacle
courses.

First, he would secure twenty feet of the
rope to either a nearby rock or stalagmite, and slide down
approximately eighty feet while safely holding the end of a lit
torch in his teeth. Once he got to the end of the rope, he would
drop the torch to see where, and if, it would land. For the most
part, he found that the torch simply disappeared into the abyss,
thus enshrouding him in utter darkness.

Luck still wasn’t with him even after the
first week of diligent searching, even though he had already
covered the first three obstacle courses, with no success. During
the second week of diligent searching and covering three more
obstacles, he had found a grouping of human bones, but they looked
like they had been there for decades, maybe even centuries. By the
end of the second week, he slowly began to give up hope.

After all, there was only one more obstacle
course—eight possible spots—that Vakshia could have fallen. Grimly,
Baltor reasoned that she probably had not advanced to this stage in
the short amount of time that she had been here. He thus decided to
explore only one per night, so he wouldn’t be as tired during the
day.

During the morning times throughout the third
week of Baltor’s search, his drill instructor mostly watched and
said very little as his student went through all the various
combinations of the basic fighting styles while holding onto a wide
variety of training weapons: offensive attacks, defensive blocks
and rolls. After all, Baltor’s movements were “flawless” just about
every single time!

For this reason, he was always allowed to
spend his afternoons, evenings and nights—training on his own. In
addition, during those early morning hours, he continued to search
the gorges and valleys in the sixth obstacle course for Vakshia,
but only one per night as earlier decided.

Finally, on the first night of the fourth
week of the boy’s quest to find his one and only friend, there was
one last deep valley that he knew about and could check. He had
earlier promised himself that if he didn’t find her here tonight,
he would give up for now.

After securing nearly thirty feet of the rope
around a solid tube of rock that spanned from floor to ceiling, he
rappelled his way down the smooth slope of the valley. Just like
every time before, once he reached the bottom of the rope, he then
dropped the torch and watched it fall—this time, however, the torch
slid down to the bottom of the valley approximately twenty feet,
and what Baltor saw shocked him.