Naomi

Naomi didn't have much trouble locating Esar. No sooner had she climbed a tree to get a better look at the surroundings than she spotted him on his way back to the village, scowling hard enough to stop an erupting volcano.

"There you are!" She jumped down, landing on her feet but without quite the grace she'd hoped for.

Esar jumped. "Are you trying to give me a heart attack?"

"No, but I am mad at you." Naomi scowled back at him. "I came to tell you—Jason's back in the village. I guess he ran into some folks from the Sanctuary and they brought him back."

Esar breathed a heavy sigh of relief. "Oh, thank—why are you angry with me?"

Naomi let all her disappointment and frustration pour out in a rush. "Because—because when those soldiers were all surrounding me, when I got to the town and there was a house burning down, when we saw the construct and I tried to catch up with it, I couldn't do anything. I was useless. Because I don't know how to use the power that I have, I can't help when people need help. And I don't want to be useless any more."

"This isn't the right time for this conversation." Esar tried to push his way past her, but Naomi wasn't about to let him brush her aside. She stepped up to block his path.

"When will it be the right time, then? When will you teach me what I need to know?"

"I am already teaching you the things you need to know," Esar said.

"But I still don't know how those Rispara in the past did the things that they did! They could run on the air, or split the earth, or make buildings melt, and all I managed to do was get myself stuck in a rock! I'm scared, Esar. I know I'm going to have to fight. I'm going to have to stop a construct or—or who-knows-what. But when I thought that bird was what attacked the village and set that house on fire, I was so scared, because I didn't have a clue how I was going to stop it. And if those so-called knights try something nasty at the Sanctuary—"

"Naomi. There should never be any reason for you to fight other people."

"But they were awful," Naomi protested. "It's not fair—"

"It's not your fight!" Esar's voice thundered through the air and struck Naomi silent. "I know you want to right every injustice in my world, but there's so much that you don't understand. You are not the arbiter of justice for the people of Elorhe, and if you ever turn that power of yours against another human being—"

"You don't understand what I'm saying!" Naomi's eyes stung. It hurt, what Esar was implying about her. Didn't he know her better than that by now? "I would never attack anyone with my power. Never. But if someone else attacks us, what do you want me to do, just stand back and let them? Do you want me to let them hurt you, or Jason, or Kelsam?"

That seemed to be a possibility that Esar hadn't considered. He didn't answer Naomi's question right away, so she went on.

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"I know, there's a lot that I don't understand, maybe some of it I'll never understand, but I can't understand what you won't explain. At least Adrin doesn't hide things from me."

Esar narrowed his eyes. "I fail to see what Adrin has to do with this."

Naomi knew that bringing up Adrin might backfire, but she'd hoped it might help get through to Esar. He'd come around on Adrin being trustworthy, more or less, but it still didn't sit well with him that Naomi had consultations with him while everyone slept.

"Adrin has everything to do with this," Naomi said, walking backwards in front of Esar as they returned to the village. "He's Prince Ethereal, and it's his job to protect Elorhe. And he wants me to help. He—"

"Do you think I don't want you to help? Why do you think I am going through all of this?" They were close enough to other people to attract their attention, and Esar lowered his voice to a whisper. "We will finish this discussion later."

Naomi wrinkled her nose, but the delay wasn't all bad. It gave her more time to figure out what she needed to say to convince him to teach her what she needed to know. Maybe Kelsam would be able to help?

The girl with the blonde hair hurried towards them. "You are Naomi, are you not? I did not get a chance to say hello to you before you ran away. And you are Esar?"

Jason followed her a step or two behind. The two of them looked out of place among the brown-skinned, black-haired Elorhans, but while Jason never looked quite at ease, the girl looked quite comfortable and spoke in a cheerful tone.

"Who's this?" Esar asked Jason.

"You can call me Tlaya," the girl answered on her own behalf.

"Tlaya?" Naomi repeated, trying out the strange combination of letters at the beginning of the name. "Am I saying it right?"

"Tla-ya." She pronounced it slowly, with just a slightly different nuance than Naomi's attempt. "But you are very close and I don't mind. Jason says you are coming back to the Sanctuary tonight. I am staying there too so I will come with you."

Naomi almost asked Tlaya where she was from, but then she remembered how much she always hated being asked that question. The only thing worse than that had been when someone asked her what she was. No doubt Tlaya already knew that she stood out here, there was no need to rub in the fact with blunt questions.

"What the hell is she doing here?" Esar muttered behind her. For a moment Naomi thought he meant Tlaya, but Esar was already striding off in another direction, to where Kelsam was talking to a woman whose wavy black hair had a reddish cast. She dressed in the same sort of simple, loose-collared tunic that the Devoted usually wore, but she didn't have one of the fancy braided belts to go along with it.

"Who's that?" Naomi asked.

"That is Guennet Gabarias, the younger sister and heir of Lady Saiglen Gabarias," Tlaya said, as if reciting a lesson she'd memorized.

"Saiglen?" Naomi repeated. "Hope she's not like her sister." She'd heard about Saiglen Gabarias from both Adrin and Esar, and neither thought very highly of her.

“She is very different from her sister,” Tlaya said. “I believe. I have never met her sister.”

“I know I was a rotten little brat when we were at school together in Norana,” Guennet was saying to Esar. “I’m sorry. I hope you believe me when I say that I’ve changed.”

Esar crossed his arms. “Hm,” he said, as if he wasn’t convinced.

“What brings you and Kelsam this far north?” she asked.

“We’re on our way to Thaliron,” Esar replied tersely.

“Oh? What did you dream about that was worth walking all the way to Thaliron?” Guennet said.

Esar didn’t answer her question. “We were hoping to book a ship in Chacry.”

“Well I’m afraid you’ve walked into a hornet’s nest,” Guennet said. “You may still be able to book passage in Chacry, but that’s where Norsyff’s made his capital.”

“That’s unfortunate,” Esar said.

“To say the least!” Kelsam said. “Esar . . .”

“We’ll talk about it later,” Esar said. “I think we need to see what’s going on in Rhadasy.”

“We’ll help any way that we can,” Kelsam added.