Chapter 104: Chapter 37

Tibs closed the windows in the room. No one who’d watched them in the inn had essence, but adventurers could be bought, and because they needed to pay off what they owed to the guild, Tibs expected a lot of them didn’t care what the work was. Even Runners in town needed coins, and he knew few of those left well enough to trust they wouldn’t spy on him for a few silver. He wished he knew how Alistair had used his essence to keep anyone from listening to their private conversations.

At least, that was a question he could ask the next time he saw his teacher.

Khumdar watched him with a calculating expression again, and Tibs did his best not to question the cleric’s change in attitude, despite his explanation.

Tibs pulled the chair away from the table and sat. “How did you get your audience?”

Khumdar sat on his bed, looking thoughtful. “I do not know that the method I used will apply to you. In becoming a cleric, a show of devotion is required. It is not simply about reaching your chosen element. A teacher cannot take you to them.”

Tibs chuckled. “I fell off a cliff, was buried, and threw myself in a fire, then a pool of corruption. The only audience I had the guild’s way was with Water.”

Khumdar thought about it, then nodded. “True. You also mentioned how the elements behaved as if they were expecting you. It is possible leniency is being accorded in your case.”

“Yeah,” Tibs said dejectedly. “I’m special.”

The cleric smiled. “Being special does not have to be a burden. It is what allows you to heal us.”

Tibs sighed. “I don’t mind that part or the one about having more than one element. It’s the guild treating me special that’s annoying.”

Khumdar raised an eyebrow. “I do not believe that falls on the elements, but on you. They are not what compelled you to save the dungeon, after all.” He paused. “Although they may have played a part in how you survived being doused in corruption.”

“You think so?” They hadn’t spoken much about it. Tibs hadn’t wanted to relive that time and Khumdar never volunteered information.

“When I reached you, there was so much of it that I do not know how you were not already on your way to melting. I doubt even Don would survive contact with so much corruption. There is a limit to the protection an element affords us when used against us.”

Tibs swallowed as he remembered the pain. “Tell me about how you got your audience.”

Khumdar hesitated and Tibs wondered if that reluctance in sharing what he knew would be something he’d have to deal with once he had the element.

“I stole the technique.” The cleric looked away.

“Are you ashamed?” Tibs asked in surprise.

“I am not…proud of what I did. Theft is not something I was raised with. There are rogues within purity, but you would not recognize them as such, I expect. I supposed that was my first indication darkness was which element pulled at me. It is the technique the purity clerics use. I modified it to suit my purpose.”

Tibs considered that. “So I’ll be able to use it for the other essences too?”

“I expect so, yes. The issue you will face will be in finding locations where you can perform the…ceremony.” He frowned. “Then again, you do not wish to become a cleric. The requirements may not be as stringent. I can guide you to the location for my element, and as there is only one location for purity, that will dictate where you go for that one. I am unsure how you will proceed for light.”

Tibs shrugged. “I’ll learn how to have the audience, then worry about figuring out where I’ll do it. Maybe I can figure out a way to ask Harry.”

“Please allow me to be present when you make the attempt.” The cleric grinned. “Watching you attempt to lie to a man so in touch with Light will be entertaining.” He became thoughtful. “There is much of the cleric in what I have observed of him.”

“So, what do I have to do?”

Khumdar shook himself out of his thoughts and focused on him. “A cleric must show their devotion before they can attempt to have an audience. They will spend seven days in solitary meditation, considering their place within Purity. They will have nothing but the robe to remind them of who they are and water. Once their solitude is over, they will travel through purity and again show their devotion by stopping along the way and explaining why they are right for them. Those seeking to be clerics must be pure in their words and actions, so that—” the cleric paused and chuckled. “I am reciting the dictates. Those will not be required of you, other than possibly being honest in your request. The elements know our heart, and trying to trick them may be…deadly.”

“Your thoughts,” Tibs said, remembering his conversation with Corruption. Khumdar looked at him with curiosity. “They take the words they need so they can talk with us from our mind, so they probably know the rest, too.”

The cleric nodded slowly. “That may be true. Doctrines tend to be embellished so it will sound more… poignant. But you must still be true in showing your devotion, and once again before the element. Or I had to. After speaking with Runners, I find that might be a cleric-centric requirement. And they are waiting for you. Your presence and ability to gain that shadow seems to be all that is required of you.”

Tibs stared at the cleric. “How do you know about that? I never talked about how I got them.”

Khumdar smiled. “Learning secrets is not only about listening to the words said. It is also about what is not said, how the words are said, what you look like when you say them. Darkness makes learning secrets easier, but it is not how I am able to learn them. And I did not know you had to do it until this very moment. Learning secrets is also in wording your own words so the other will feel compelled to reveal something.”

He crossed his legs. “When you spoke of your audience with Corruption, you mentioned he gave you the shadow, and you sounded perplexed by the action. I do not know if the others noticed.” He stopped. “Maybe Carina noticed, as attentive as Jackal is, he trusts you enough not to watch so keenly and Mez… has other things on his mind. Your words made me think back to what you said of your previous interactions. You referred to it as taking the shadow the times you mentioned it. As you would not survive doing something an element did not want you to do, I figured it was a test of your determination and wits.”

Tibs stared at the smug cleric. That was a lot to have worked out from the little Tibs remembered saying.

“Darkness will be as the others, I suspect. Maybe more difficult as it is about secrets and weakness. It may be more reluctant to let you have it.” He closed his eyes. “But I cannot envision the method it will use to keep you from it.” He sighed. “I wish there were others I could ask, to understand how it is that you and I saw it, while Jackal, Carina, and Mezano did not.”

Tibs shrugged. That part wasn’t important to him. “So the first step is to meditate. How do I do that?”

Khumdar looked at Tibs, stunned. “I do not know. Or rather, it is something I learned so long ago I have not had to think about how I do it. It is a skill everyone with purity is taught.” He paused and his gaze became distant. “Meditation is thinking on nothing, while thinking on everything.”

Tibs groaned. Just the way Khumdar said it gave him a headache.

“Remember, there is embellishment to doctrine, and purity teaches through it. They want to maintain the impression that only those special enough can achieve the state needed to proceed forward. It would not do for the common folk to think they could become one of them.”

Tibs’s eyes snapped open as realization hit. “You were supposed to be a purity cleric.”

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“What?” Surprise crossed the cleric’s face and Tibs thought he saw worry there.

“You said you were taught young. Then that everyone in purity is taught. That means you’re from that Temerity family, the one Carina accused you of being, then you…no, Mez diverted her and you got that pleased smile. That’s how you know the way to be a cleric.”

The smile that followed looked forced. “I am glad you listen to what others say. I believe Darkness will indeed welcome you. Having said that, I would ask that you not speak of what you have worked out with anyone, especially not Carina.”

“Why? She’s our friend and teammate.”

“The answer is complicated and would reveal things that are not for me to say.”

Tibs narrowed his eyes. “You tried really hard to get her to say something when you first joined. I’m guessing it’s whatever you don’t want to tell me now.”

“It is. She was not a friend then. Getting her to reveal her secret was an amusing proposition. Now… No, even then. Tibs, you must understand. There is a difference between knowing a secret and revealing it. Darkness demands that I amass them, and a revealed secret is no longer one, but there is also a power in holding them over the people who have them. Of making sure they know you are aware of them. That is not a good thing, I believe. It is not something Darkness demands of me; it is a part of me. One I try not to enable. I was not meant to be a cleric, Tibs. My family does not produce clerics. But this part of me made me… unworthy of being part of purity at all.”

“It’s like if I showed someone I broke into their house,” Tibs said, “and told them I can do it anytime I want. Use that to make them afraid of me.”

“No, it is not—” Khumdar started angrily, then stopped. “Actually… yes. How do you keep from doing such?”

Tibs shrugged. He’d never thought about it that way until Khumdar explained how it was for him. “I get not wanting to hurt people, but why not use what you know? What’s the point of knowing so much and not using it?”

The cleric smiled sadly. “Have you heard stories of dragons?”

Tibs shook his head. He’d heard the word but didn’t know where.

“In the bard’s tales, they are great beasts who decimate the land seeking riches and hoard what they find. They kill any seeing to claim them back. They do nothing with them other than hold on to them. And know they have them.” He chuckled. “Darkness has made of me a dragon hoarding secrets.”

“But those are stories. You don’t have to be like that. You’re telling me one right now. Even the nobles use some of the coins they have to show the rest they have them. Bardik told me secrets.” And used them to manipulate him, Tibs thought bitterly.

“A cleric is closer to the element than others. I cannot know if I would still have a desire to search for and hold secrets as I do, if I had remained with Purity. But it is who I am. Parting with secrets is difficult.”

“I won’t tell yours,” Tibs said solemnly. “You’re my friend.”

“I thank you.”

“So, meditating?” Tibs asked, bringing the conversation to what he needed to understand. “Is it just sitting around not doing anything?”

Khumdar chuckled. “No. It is thinking as little as possible so that you can understand as much as possible. I know,” he said at Tibs’s groan, “but for as much as it sounds like doctrine, that is the core of it. When I am able to think about as little as possible, a thought will push through, and in that, I may find an understanding of one of the questions I had. I do not know that you need to do so, as you have already had audiences without it, but it is how purity clerics go about it, and how I did as well.”

“Seven days,” Tibs mused. “No food, and only water. The water’s easy.” He coated his hand and reabsorbed it. “But I don’t know if I can go without food for that long.” Again. He added mentally. He had gone hungry often before coming here, and now that he ate regularly, the idea of not eating scared him.

“It is difficult. It is why it is part of the purification needed so you will achieve the state that will bring you to the attention of the Element.

“Except that it’s for purity clerics,” Tibs said hopefully.

“It worked for me, therefore there is a truth to it.”

Tibs nodded, his hopes dashed. Then he recalled what Ganny said. “The way to an audience is a strong emotion while around that element. Fear is what I used for mine. I always ended up thinking I was about to die. I guess not eating for seven days has to be like I’m about to die.” He didn’t remember pain from hunger, only a void that always needed to be filled.

“If that is correct, you can arrange so that you will feel the fear, but not be in danger.”

Tibs shook his head. “We tried it for air. I fell from roofs and tall trees with Carina to catch me. I wasn’t afraid because I knew she was there. There was some fear and doubt, but I trusted her to catch me. It’s when I tripped and fell off the cliff with no one to catch me that I was really afraid. It’s when I had my audience.”

Khumdar considered it. “There is a possibility that the meditation creates a change that allows for the audience to occur without such heightened emotions.”

Tibs shrugged. “You know more about it than I do.”

The cleric chuckled. “Having been here and in the dungeon, as well as knowing you, I have lost some of the belief I held at knowing so much. It is possible much of the doctrines are only about ensuring those in power within purity maintain that control. If I had believed all I needed to do was starve myself on the Black Night, I might have attempted it sooner, instead of preparing myself in secret for years.” He smiled. “You will be a demonstration of how little of them are needed.”

“Except that I’m special,” Tibs said with a shrug.

“And yet, despite the Elements waiting for you, you must go through at least some of the same process as others seeking an audience. I expect that their desire for you to have the audience does not extend to easing your way to them.”

“Rules,” Tibs whispered. “Corruption said they all have rules they follow,” he explained.

“I… would not have expected that.”

Tibs shrugged again. “So, when’s this Dark Night?”

“That,” Khumdar replied, “I do not know.”

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