Sid Za'Darmondiel.
Hegus Territory, Shujen Kingdoms.
***
'Tell me what you know of this one.'
I hesitated to move my eyes from where Priestess Shaenya's hand lingered. Of all the Priestesses of House Za'Darmondiel, her hand was the swiftest, the boniest, the most conditioned- the most acquainted with my face.
'Veil of Shadows.' I quickly signed back, keeping my eyes on those lithe fingers. 'He is the most exceptional of the three monks. His innate dexterity and agility make him perfect to be a monk. He has trained greatly to build his strength. His conditioning is high. He has shown no fear, even in the face of drow.'
'He must have experience with us.' Priestess Shaenya mused. 'Not counting Elg-Horr, of course.'
Speaking of. 'Do you think the rumors are true, P-"
The sound of a snapping twig sealed my lips shut. The twig was my mouth. And the agent that snapped it was that hated hand of Priestess Shaenya Za'Darmondiel. My lovely older sister.
Cursing indigently within my mind, I thought back to when the Champion first arrived at the Halls. Human children were at his sides, the news of that spread like a cave flood and quickly died down once the Abbot took them into her wing. Then, for over a month, any and all talk regarded the Bool.
Lecherous gazes lingered on him for every minute of the day. They openly declared him prime breeding stock while seeming to ignore the similarities in our features. And he did not seem to care. About anything. Excepting the humans and this cat, of course. But then again, they were all exceptional.
The cat was a rarity in himself, being bald, ascetic, and introverted, unlike the typical members of their species. Not to mention, he was highly skilled and intelligent. So much that I hardly trained him at all. But it did not stop there.
Indeed, Felipians* were renowned for their agility. It was beyond comparison to anything beyond elves. And there was none in all the realms more fluid and graceful than the Drow. Except for this one, it seemed.
Even while Skipping with the Wind, I struggled to keep up with his bounds and leaps through the trees, relegating me to stare at the deeply corded muscles bulging through the pinkish-gray skin of the Twilight Monk.
Yet another eccentricity. Unlike any other monk, his meditation was split in two. Two hours at sunrise coupled with two hours at sunset. And many of us were eager to see what such a routine would merit out in the open.
That, however, would have to wait; for Veil of Shadows pounced into the midst of an orcish war camp and pressed on without hesitating. A flash of gold fire turned into flames of darkness that fell to envelop his form, leaving him unseen by the countless orcs as he skittered to the tallest tent in the camp.
I, however, could see the cold fires of his ki swell and blossom into the same image adorned on his robes. A black, leafless tree sitting before a setting sun.
It was like a slap in the face, both to me and to the orc chieftain, stomping out from his tent to see a lone cat-man crouch low before a set of claws ripped out his throat. That tree, worn by Veil of Shadows and the other humans, lessened the weight of Veil of Shadows' slaughter.
Their strength. That human's weapon. Their fearlessness. It all made sense. To me, at least.
Priestess Shaenya seemed impressed only by Veil of Shadow's indiscriminate killing. Her lips quivered in delight when he pounced from the gloom. Her eyes widened further with glee as a body fell, followed by another, and another, until only the bald Felipian was left standing- walking with nary a look back.
Then she laughed.
Priestess Shaenya laughed and laughed until Veil of Shadows disappeared in the distance, then stopped so suddenly that a part of me believed a creature of the dark was stalking nearby, only for her to mutter out a prayer and usher me along with a single step of her own.
'Of all monks, his ability is the most beneficial to us.' Shaenya signed. 'We must learn how to obtain it.'
'In time, we will, Priestess.' I motioned back, risking another slap. 'The cat will leave here with the sole task of forming a monastery of his own. Our observers would have surely cracked the code by then.'
I had no doubts that our minds revolved around differing ideas. Priestess Shaenya, as always, was concerned with obtaining power, unknowing of how or why this cat could wield both light and darkness. I believed with the utmost certainty that her scheming mind was attempting to figure out a way to recruit or perhaps even enslave Veil of Shadows.
I, however, knew the truth. The cat had a master already. One that could grant power to others like a god.
Like Elg-Horr.
Both her ideals and my truth were confirmed a few hours later. It was just before sunrise when an astral projection flew overhead, instructing me to relay a message to Shaenya.
'There is nothing here.'
How I hated these High Priestesses. All powerful, except when they needed to see ki or astral projections. Then they grew maddened by their inability to perceive, resulting in a bony hand tapping out a drum against my face.
With a slap, Priestess Shaenya insisted that the light was playing tricks on them. The projection was adamant that it was no trick of the light, earning me another slap. Her refusal earned me many more until she bothered herself with a change of beliefs. But she did not even do that. She refused to believe something could have transported the bodies away, tore down all the tents, and cleared out any evidence of the camp's existence in mere hours.
I could not believe it. For I knew exactly what did it. But I did not tell Shaenya. I let her place the issue at the end of her priorities and sent the junior monks off. That, and I… devoted myself to achieving her- and by extension my goal of learning about this Way of Twilight. So I led her to the grove in which the cat sat in meditation.
Though I had schemes of my own, I admit that watching Veil of Shadows meditate was… unremarkable. At first. But soon, a thick aura of magic began to seep into the air, breathing life into the forest. Rodents and other small critters came pushing through the snow. Owls flew down to perch nearby. Big cats strolled in and curled up near him to bathe in that amber glow until the sun crested the Mortal Plane to cast the burning blues of daylight overhead.
Then he stood and began running once again. But when he stopped to fight again, no longer was his body wreathed in flames of darkness. His flesh burned within a golden fire, rendering him invisible in the daytime sun. Even as he strolled by common travelers and warred against feral orcs.
It was the most amazing display to have befallen my eyes, still like that of a child's. A month-long play of guerrilla warfare, self-instruction, and survival. Through the Plains of Hegus and up to Kardor. Across the Tridanuiyrang River and past Fethondrarond until we made it to the shores near Formazinferynd and skipped over to the border of Chaulort. Then we watched it in reverse.
It was then that Priestess Shaenya began her own play. Put into motion by the utterance of a single word as we passed one of the many camps the cat decimated on the journey out. "Strange."
She said nothing more. She only looked at the patches of dried blood left untouched by the fresh snow and continued walking.
Under normal circumstances, we would have remained silent so as to judge the mental backlash of taking a life. Many Bodhi Tree students already had, we knew, but some had not. And more were reluctant to kill still.
It went without saying, but monks did not have such luxuries. We were taught to respect life equally. But we- like druids or witches, were not pacifists. We not only killed, but we refused to let the weight of killing pull our minds, bodies, and spirits down. For drow, that was as easy as breathing. But humans- and those raised alongside them, were the frequent exception. And so, we were to make a call for or against corrective training.
It came as no surprise, but Veil of Shadows needed no such corrections. He had no qualms about killing. Felipians were, above all, pragmatic survivalists. They were not, however, known for being particularly smart or cunning. But again, Veil of Shadows was the fearless exception.
"Yes. It is as strange as the hour your incorporeal spies reported it in." He smirked, forcing both of us to stare at him with our mouths wide.
It was indeed the first time either of us heard him speak, and the gracefulness of his intellectual tone rocked both of us onto our heels. But he kept moving. Kept darting through the Plains of Hegus, forcing us to catch up.
He did not slow until we returned and joined the two other two humans, Rua and Peter, in meditating. In waiting for the infamous drow to return. And perhaps listen in on our comparative tales of their prowess.