[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.”He felt too small to speak.She held his gaze, taking his measure.“This is what you’re going against.The physical danger is trivial.To die physically is a small thing, compared to dying spiritually.It is an ember trying to glow next to the sun.“Children imagine monsters in the dark.” She shook her head.“The monster here is fear.I gave you the feeling of a cold cloud in your heart because I wanted to intensify your dread of being lost and blind in the cavern.Imagine a fear like being lost and blind among the stars.If you let yourself feel that fear, your spirit shrivels.”He didn’t dare ask a question.“Only those who become seers are able to look beyond the monstrosity to the truth.” She got a faraway look and then returned her eyes to Aku.“Did Shonan ever tell you that on the battlefield the true killer is fear?”“He said it over and over.”“In the spiritual world the true killer is also fear.If you quail, you die.”“I’m ready.”“No, you’re not.You’re a beginner as a shape-shifter, you haven’t apprenticed yourself to a seer, you haven’t learned a thousand lessons you needed before you came to me.You have no idea how ignorant you are, or how hard it will be.But for whatever reason life has put this task in your hands.For the coming days you are not a relative, and I am not your great-grandmother.I am Tsola, the Seer and Wounded Healer.You seek to discover your powers.I am your daunting taskmaster.”She mused.“Do you know how to begin?”“No.”“Good.You tell the truth.Which you didn’t do with the mother of your child, which you didn’t do with me.Because you were afraid of her reaction, you didn’t tell her you are a shape-shifter.Because you were afraid of losing my respect, you denied your fear of the adventure in front of you.“So now we must make a bargain.At every moment, in every word, with every gesture, you will tell the truth.Not only to me, but to yourself.That is your pledge.That is the cost of crossing the threshold of the world you want to go to.You will tell the truth to me, and you will tell it to yourself.”She raised her hand for the traditional gesture of sealing a pact, and he followed her lead.At the same moment they slapped the ground.“And right now, Aku, son of Meli,” the old woman said, “what is your truth? The spirit inside you, how does it feel?”He nodded once before he spoke.“Scared and excited.”“That’s a good beginning,” she said.“Now get some sleep.We have hard work to do.”18Tsola waited for Aku to wake up, sit up, and focus his eyes across the fire and on her.“Truth,” she said.Aku shook his head, held it still, and shook it again hard.His mind was still cobwebbed from sleep.He was trying to grow, half consciously, into his powers.While he was awake, he grew by thinking about being as much owl as man.While he was asleep, he grew by dreaming himself as an owl.He was exhausted from working in both states.She handed him a tea she’d brewed to snap his mind awake.The young man—she refused to think of him as the boy he was—took a long swallow.She looked over at her son Bola, curled up in sable elegance.They both felt for Aku.Bola had guided many seekers through the cavern to her, and she’d initiated most of them—nothing she did was more important than creating shamans to guide the people.Generally, the seekers brought nothing but the awareness that they were different, that they bore the talent and responsibility of some kind of special powers.They came, learned something, and came back year after year before coming to the trial.Even after the most patient training, some failed the trial.So why the dilemma of this young man, her own great-grandson? He had a genuine gift, and in time he might become a true shaman.Why, then, why, did he have to risk the trial now, when he was a spiritual infant? She was probably guiding him to his death.She shrugged inside herself [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]