So, I shall provide a three fer excerpt, going back in time a bit. Caution. There be typos aplenty. Also, this is longer than usual, to make up for missing so many days of posting.
Lastly, those of you that wish, feel free to make any comments by clicking on the comment link at the end of each post. You can post anonymously.
the first of three:
“How would the Tribe not know?” asked Tracker2.
“Simple enough. This apprenticeship, made in the wild, with only us five as witnesses, is simply not addressed. There is a public display when Sylk is apprenticed to The Herbalist. Afterward, as Sylk goes out to meet the needs of herb gathering, Moa’qi can meet with him out of sight of the Tribe, and conduct the bulk of his training in the wild.”
Tracker3 opened his mouth, then closed it, attempting to mask this change of mind with a long sip of coffee. Moa’qi peered at Tracker3 from under his brow, while considering the suggestion of Tracker1. Tracker2 offered, “This duplicity does not seem right. Usually only ill comes from such deliberate subterfuge.”
Tracker1 nodded, saying in a conciliatory manner, “It’s just a suggestion. I suppose we can just leave the situation with Gwadi and The Herbalist alone, and let nature run as it will.” No one seemed comfortable with that. Stirring from his self-imposed silence, Moa’qi asked, “Are there no other suitable candidates for apprenticeship to The Herbalist?”
Tracker3 replied, “None with Sylk’s aptitude. He is, as you noted, somewhat unique.” Tracker2 agreed with a nod. Tracker1 was silent. Finally Moa’qi spoke, “I am against this surreptitious apprenticeship in principle and in fact. Nothing good can come of it, and frankly, I cannot honestly state that Sylk will not be the worse for this. The need for me to train in private will mean that I cannot take advantage of those opportunities that present themselves in the course of events. The quality of the training will drop dramatically. I doubt I can pass on what I must.”
“What then, of Gwadi?” asked Tracker1.
More silence. Each man alone with his thoughts, the Dark wore on. Finally, Tracker3 suggested they sleep on the issue, and discuss openly in the morning. Sylk startled the men by piping in with “Good idea! That way I can sleep, and tomorrow I can actually be involved in my destiny!” Tracker3 chuckled and bid everyone good night. Tracker2 continued to sip his coffee and stare at the fire. When he finally finished, he also turned in. Sylk actually fell asleep at this time, and thus missed the conversation between Moa’qi and Tracker1.
excerpt 2:
Silence ensued. Tracker1 was off-balance. This was not going the way he wanted. He had wanted to apprentice Sylk to The Herbalist, but it may be that it would not happen naturally. For reasons that he barely dared think on, he did not want Sylk apprenticed to Moa’qi. But he was, and there was no denying it, with three witnesses.
However, First Chair could make decisions for the good of the Tribe, and depending on who was First Chair, he could potentially influence the flow of things in the Tribe. And have the right people apprenticed to the right people.
Probing, he asked Moa’qi, “Will you then refuse the office?”
“As you mentioned earlier, Tracker1, there is another time and another place for this conversation.”
An emotion that had been bubbling below the surface in Tracker1 for several years came to the surface. He did not know what to name it, he just felt it. A seething violent sensation. Moa’qi was so smug, so self assured. Truth be unshaded, Tracker1 was afraid of Moa’qi and felt inferior. However, his temperament would not allow him to feel inferior, and so he twisted a bit inside, and found or manufactured numerous instances of some slight or other perpetrated against him by Moa’qi. He sat in the dark, nursing his ill will, and plotting. He did not turn in for a long time.
excerpt 3 (please note, i have also taken to not naming the chapters, and I lost count, so bear that in mind.:
Chapter whichever
Sylk felt a prickling sensation over his whole body, and was instantly awake. It was still Dark Time, and there was absolutely nothing to see. Playing across his body was a tingling that was somehow familiar. Laying still in the total darkness, he struggled with his memory, trying to place the sensation, trying to remember where or when he had felt it. The sensation was so strong and unmistakable, sweeping over him from left to right. Not until it passed, and his body no longer subjected to the dancing touch playing across his body, was he able to begin to search his memory cleanly.
Holding still, staring into the opaqueness above him, he was drawn back in his mind to the morning of the dying girl. When the impossible vessel that (what did his Master call it, a ScramJet?) had come from the sky and rotated, he had felt a muted version of this sensation. It had happened as what he took for the nose of the conveyance had rotated past him. Gently rotating his head in the direction the prickling sensation had left him, he thought he could barely discern a reddish sparkling crossing the ground. As it encountered the sleeping form of one of the Trackers, there was a wraithlike interplay of blue and red dancing and flitting across the body. Then it was gone.
Laying in the dark, his senses straining, he strove to feel, hear, see, taste, touch, anything. A Bruta herd lay off a day’s march oblique to the village. He could feel the three Trackers. Moa’qi he had recognized by comparison with the three. This surprised and intrigued him. He had not noticed Moa’qi before, except when he was moving. He theorized that he had been sensing him along, but that his mind had disregarded the information as non-vital. But this morning, after the prickling sensation, when he was not taking anything for granted, he could now feel things that were not moving, like The Bruta, or his Master.
One of the night crawling ropy creatures was moving into it’s den in the ground. From this Sylk knew that morning was coming. He realized at that moment that the timing of the prickling sensation had been when people were often deepest asleep. Slowly and noiselessly he contracted his abdominals and hip flexors and sat up.
It was still pitch black, and there was not yet even a hint that Dark was surrendering to Light on the horizon. Yet, it must be close to time. Faintly then, he felt a new sensation, a strange yet this time familiar feeling. Dew began to precipitate out of the chill dark. He felt it form on his skin and in his light clothing. He almost felt that he could see it, then realized that Light was coming. He watched as drops appeared on his forearm, coalesced and slid. He was intent, comparing and contrasting visual information with what his skin was sending. He noted the dew gatherer nearest to him, as it gradually filled. And for the first time he realized he was awake before his Master.
Ok, bonus excerpt:
Moa’qi finished up the movement by bending his elbows and allowing his hands to come naturally down and to his sides, and then forward to lightly rest on his knees, at the original starting point. The last vestige of breath was released through these final actions, and then he breathed naturally. Sylk realized it was morning. Every movement had mimicked the action of Light sweeping through Dark, and had been timed accordingly. There had been two full breaths. Enormously deep and controlled inhalations, and immaculate, deliberate exhalations. Sylk had also perceived a certain resonance within Moa’qi’s body. It seemed to be to, or from, or maybe in response to or acknowledgment of, the high frequency oscillation he felt from the light source on the horizon. A queer kind of sense memory flooded his mind, and he realized the light source contained, at a lower kind of intensity, or was it simply that it was competing with numerous other pulsations, that prickly sensation he had experienced in the Dark. As he was noticing that, it disappeared, covered or masked by the riot of sensation his skin was feeling from the Light. The innervation almost overwhelmed him, and he shook his head and more or less turned off or set his perceptions on mute, that he could recover and not be insensate due to over-stimulation.
He stood abruptly, slaking the dew from his body in a detached automatic manner. Struggling with the urge to run and shout, the nervous tension in his body felt unbearable. He looked mutely at his Master, raised his eyebrows, shrugged his shoulders, and bolted. He ran away from the coming light, toward the vestige of Sombre disappearing at the opposite horizon. Legs pumping furiously, he distracted his mind with exercise. He ran until his lungs were pounding, and legs tiring, and he pushed himself harder still. His mind had to come to grips with the demands on the body, and he began to regulate and husband the breath, changing his breathing pattern to allow for easier inhalation and more fluid and less constricted exhalation. This reduced the somewhat antagonistic relationship found then the heart and lungs are called upon at the same time, when the deep breaths can constrict and inhibit smooth pumping, and engendered an environment conducive to a cooperative effort. Of necessity, he had slowed some, and was no longer at the frantic, nearly panicked pace, but he was till running at what most would consider top speed. His healthy tuned body was coming under control, and he ran now with a will and determination to rid himself of what he imagined were the toxins of too much thinking and not enough action. Running hard, he rounded a bush and began a sweeping circle to take him round to camp. He could feel his mind relaxing, and his gait slowed, though it was still a run, not a trot or jog. He was moving at probably 3/5ths speed when he spied the body ahead. He was moving so fast that he could do nothing but leap through the air, and over the body. He did not stop running, but did slow. He judged from the location and the size that it was likely The Other from Flat Rock that had injured the girl. He noted the location, the lay of the land, some key markers on the horizon, and slowed to a trot that he could practice a flora fauna whistle marker to relay to Moa’qi. He struggled with how to identify The Other, as there was not a whistle sign for that entity. Finally, he melded a symbol for a Tribe Mate, and Bruta. He hoped that Moa’qi would make the connection, and that the Trackers would simply think he botched one or the other. His Master would know better, since he had demonstrated mastery on their hike to Flat Rock.
And finally, to get us up to speed:
“Let’s eat!” from Tracker3. Tracker1 did not participate in any of this, seeming aloof. He did come and sit and eat, and eventually the shared camaraderie of a relaxed meal in the open brought him out. Soon they were all talking and exchanging trail chit chat like normal. Sylk reflected on the value of shared mealtime. Truly salubrious, it could heal emotional wounds, mend minor infractions, efface distrust and replace with understanding. He smiled as he ate, feeling very good, and with an appetite to match. Tracker3 interrupted his thoughts with a question that he was doubly curious to hear answer.
“Moa’qi”, he began, “what may you tell us of this apprenticeship of Sylk’s and the Morning Sun Run?” Sylk paused in his eating, wondering what the response would be, since he knew there was no such thing, and it was a cover up for his indiscretion and lack of control this morning.
“I will share this with you, as it is not so much a secret of training or apprenticeship, as it is a conveniently forgotten tribal principle.” Moa’qi shifted easily and sipped some cardamom coffee. “You see, during the night, the breathing oftentimes becomes shallow. Why do we breathe? Of course so that we stay alive, we all know that. But how does it work?” He paused while everyone thought this through.” The old ones, of which perhaps I am the only one in that range today, used to tell us children that there was some sort of exchange taking place inside. They used to say ‘Out with the old air, in with the new air’. I asked my Master one day, why that saying started with out, rather than in, since if you don’t breathe in, you will die. He responded with a question, as he oftentimes did and asked me if we wouldn’t die if we didn’t breathe out. I had no answer of course, and told him so. So, he explained that we kind of do what fire does. We burn our food, and we must get rid of the smoke. He said it was just as important to get the poison smoke out of our bodies as it was to get the fresh clean air inside. He said the lungs can become partially full of this smoke, and we can lose some of the capacity for removal of smoke, if we don’t make sure that we use all the lungs at least for some period of time. He stated that since we are inherently lazy, the best way to do this was to run. Running hard, because of the demands placed on the body, both a need for clean air, but, and this he insisted quite clearly, the more important requirement to rid the body of smoke, forced the lungs to be used to capacity. And, he added, that it appeared that this type of huffing and puffing was in general a very good tonic for the whole system.
“My Master added that the morning time was the best time for this because the air was the cleanest and freshest, and so you weren’t breathing in any ‘smoke’ to add to the smoke you must be rid of. So, for years, he had me do the morning run. Not a jog, mind you, but a run until you can’t run. It doesn’t require much time or much distance. Up hill is best. But, here I sit, healthy and whole, and I believe because of the morning run.”
“But,” objected Tracker3, “I have never seen you run. You did not run this morning.”
“Quite true. That, though is the secret part of the apprenticeship that I shall not share.” And that ended that line of conversation.
toodley oodley ooo
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