Gore covered the needle as it slowly emerged from the eye of the spasming man. Kai extended his hand, mentally nudging the needle higher until it hovered momentarily before slowly returning to his hand. He reached for it as he relaxed his mental hold on it, letting it fall into his palm.
“Curious,” the elder known to Kai as Quaestor Basilius leaned over the fallen man. Kai hadn’t seen the elder approach. Slight of height and build Quaestor Basilius kicked the fallen man’s twitching leg. “Not dead.” Basilius frowned as he searched the man’s outer robe and inner pockets, stripping him of his possessions. “But not a threat either.”
“No mercy that,” Sybil remarked from behind Kai.
Kai looked down into his palm at the bloody needle there. His stomach lurched inside him causing him to stumble, but he righted himself and stood fast, closing his fist over the needle. He watched as the Quaestor stood and turned towards them.
“And that, Leon, is why even the weakest movers should be well regarded.” the Quaestor stated.
“Why do you do that,” Sybil shook her head, causing her long blonde tresses to spill over her shoulder, “using your hand to guide the needle? I’ve never seen a mover do that before.” She was a head taller than Kai and fair, with vibrant golden eyes. Her deep blue robe fluttered in the wind as she stepped up to examine the fallen man.
“Just one of the many bad habits we shall rid him of,” Basilius decided. “Movers don’t use their bodies, they use their minds. It is a disciple of the mental path.” He punctuated his thought by tapping Kai’s forehead with his forefinger. “If you want to use your body to fight, then become a soldier or cenobite.”
Kai waited until the man stepped away before muttering a reply, “It helps me focus.”
He didn’t need to use his hand but it was easier when he did. He knelt and began cleaning, using the desert sand to remove all traces of blood from the needle and his palm, watching as the Quaestor moved to their dromedary and retrieve some water. Kai wasn’t sure what to think about the man, he was intense. His dark piercing grey eyes seemed to see everything, his dark leathery skin spoke of a life lived outside the protection of a city’s walls, his causal way of speaking about topics Kai had learned best to avoid.
He inspected the sliver of metal, the glint of the sun reflecting off the bronze surface. When he was sure it was clean he pressed it into the seam of his shirt collar, hiding it from all but the most thorough scrutiny.
“Are you going to finish him?” Sybil stood over the twitching man, her face inscrutable. Her dark lips were drawn in a straight line. “Or are you just going to leave him like this?”
“I’m no murderer,” Kai replied weakly, before returning to his feet and moving back toward the pack animal. Another boy stood beyond, watching the exchange. He was oddly attired, with a kind of leather and metal armor Kai had never seen before - not a warrior's armor. The armor had slots, pockets, and other mechanical oddities that were entirely foreign to Kai.
“You know as soon as we leave some sandsprike or osprey will have him for dinner right?” Fetz remarked. Kai noted the sheen of sweat and sickly pallor on the boy. Boy. They were the same age, fifteen - not even on the path yet. They were very different though. “That’s practically the same as killing him yourself.”
Kai shrugged into his leather backpack and then turned away from his traveling party. Twenty days they had walked from the port of Aenchia - twenty days in the heat and sand, with only one oasis to refill their water stores. He and Fetz, and his two minders; the implacable Quaestor Basilius, and Basilius’ personal guard Sybil. They were trekking the desert for no explainable reason.
Stolen novel; please report.
“You’re doing it again,” Fetz replied with his rapid-fire speech pattern. He drew his patchwork colorful cloak around him, hiding his strange armor. “That thing where you just ignore everyone who’s talking and just stare out at something. It’s damn creepy.” He stepped up beside Kai, looked at him, then looked out where Kai was looking.
“There’s nothing to say.” Kai sighed and turned away. “It may be practically the same, but it’s not the same. Not to me.”
The Quaestor stepped next to him, glancing over the barren sandy plateau. Did he seem to be searching for other possible ambush locations? Kai couldn’t tell. He did suspect that the man had led them here though.
“Thank you Uladius, nicely done. The next person that tries to seize us, is yours to handle Leon. Show us what you can do.”
Kai looked to Fetz. The boy swallowed and nodded before looking into the sky as though urging the sun to fall faster. Seemingly resigned to his fate he started out. The rest fell in behind him, moving eastward - ever eastward, leaving the desperate man twitching in the sand behind them.
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Night in the desert was cold. The fire reflected in Sybil's golden eyes as she warmed her hands. She looked over to the two boys that had bedded down for the night with.
“They are asleep.” She confirmed after mentally probing the pair. Fetz was out near as soon as his head hit the mat, but Kai had stayed awake longer than usual, no doubt the trials of the day still weighing on him.
“I was near asleep,” Pretek Basilius growled before sitting up in his night sack. They had traveled another day closer to the borderlands. Prey was sparse and so was dinner. Travel rations were rapidly disappearing with as much as the boys needed to eat.
“I observed them today as you commanded,” Sybil began her report. “Leon has some unusual mental paths. I’ve only experienced something similar with those that are god-touched.”
“Unfortunate, but a problem for another to solve,” Pretek observed. Those with abnormal mental development early in life often ran aground later but his task was not to prepare these children for a long life but a useful life. Useful in this case meant forging them into something exceptional before they arrived at Edidaxa.
“And Uladius?”
Sybil stared at the fire a moment before she spoke, “He is certainly suppressed, but it’s not a primal lock, or at least not only a primal lock. There is a careful working there, someone else has already meddled with him.” She looked up at Pretek.
The Quaestor looked at the fire. What he knew about Uladius wasn’t much. A child of the state, father and mother lost to the frontlines, father a strong mover, mother…. he knew little of the mother. Examinations before the last didn’t indicate anything noteworthy. But the last, that kind of talent was certainly worth developing.
“There is no way to know how traditional prompts may interact with the previous working.”
“Yes yes, I understand. No one will hold you responsible should something unfortunate happen,” he grumbled, “He’s of no use to us as he is, so either we break whatever was done to him or we break him.” The Quaestor laid back and glared at the fire.
“This should be a lesson to you, Sybil. Do one miracle for the Imperium and they will forever expect you to do them.” he pulled his sack up, and tucked it around himself. “If fortune favors me this will be my last assignment.” He stared long into the flames, then turned and looked up at the stars.
“I hope you never live to see the day when your responsibilities outweigh your measure.” The old Quaestor finally turned away from the fire. “Go ahead and start with both, maybe we will make some progress before we pick up the third candidate.”
Sybil nodded, her lips set in a firm line. “And what if we discover there was cause to suppress him?”
The old man closed his eyes with a grunt. “That’s why they sent me.”