Honor and Blood

"You're looking well, Tiella," he smiled. "And you're in the Violet! I'm amazed!"

"Well," she said with a shy smile, "It's not all that big a deal, you know. Dar wasn't even really in the Initiate."

"Dar was trained by a katzh-dashi," Tarrin chuckled. "How have you been? And where's Walten?"

"I've been doing fine," she replied. "I've been studying about every waking moment, because I'm sick of school. I want to get it overwith as fast as I can."

"I can see that. Have you decided what you want to do when you're done?"

She nodded. "I think I'm going to stay here. Aldreth doesn't seem all that exciting to me anymore. Not after everything I've seen here." She gri

"Like what?"

"Well, there was the time he made a cake explode on the table where the Council eats during formal meals," she said, ticking off her fingers. "Then there was the time he used a weave to summon about a thousand rats, who ran amok in the kitchen. Then there was the time that he turned about five stories of the outside of the South Tower green with red stripes, and then there was the time that-"

Tarrin cut her off with a laugh. "I never dreamed Walten would get like that!" he told her.

"He gets bored easily, Tarrin, you know that," she smiled at him. She looked at Je

"I was giving my big brother a chance," she gri

"Sure," she replied. Tarrin realized that Je

"I should have guessed that you two would be together," he chuckled.

"It's too bad we didn't see much of each other in the village. We missed alot of time to gossip," Je

"Well, we're old enough to appreciate it now," Tiella added. "I hate to cut this short, but I have to be in the Northeast Tower in about ten minutes," she apologized. "I just ran in for a quick bite to eat."

"What are you studying?" Tarrin asked curiously.

"I just started the Violet, so it's basic weaves," she fretted. "Water weaves. Right now, I'm learning how to manifest water, but my teacher promised she'd teach me weaves to freeze liquids today. I think that one would be handy, to cool my drinks if anything else."

"As long as you don't overdo it. Then you'd need a knife to eat your water," Tarrin told her.

Tiella laughed. "I'm still trying to figure out why Fire heats things, but Water freezes them. I thought it would be Divine that would freeze."

"There are plenty of things about the Weave we don't really understand," Tarrin told her. "For instance, why are Water weaves harder than Divine weaves? You'd think that the Orange would be a harder grade than the Violet, you know. Or for that matter, why are lessons in Mind before lessons in Earth?"

"They don't teach any real Mind weaves in Blue," Tiella told him. "They teach you how to recognize them and weaves and techniques to defend against them. You only learn Mind weaves if you stay as a katzh-dashi. I guess they don't want any freelancers out there that know Mind weaves."

Tarrin had to admit, that was a good policy. It also explained why the Blue was the second grade through which an Initiate progressed, when it should have been the last. Tarrin honestly couldn't recall how far into the Initiate he progressed, or what he had learned. What little he remembered of the Initiate was mainly what he learned from Dola

It was then that he realized that he really had very little understanding of what really went on in the Tower. He had been so against the place that he had refused to learn about much of anything, even when he was here before. But then again, he still had no real desire to learn, for he wouldn't be there much longer anyway.

He was starting to get like Jesmind, only wanting to learn things that seemed to have practical use.

Tarrin said his goodbyes to Tiella, and as she hurried over to the long table where the prepared food was kept warm for those drifting through the kitchens, it reminded him about Dar. Dar had shown some interest in Tiella, and he knew that Tiella had a crush on Dar. He wondered if they'd managed to get anywhere yet. He hoped so. Dar was rather cosmipolitan, being an Arkisian, but Tiella was probably still a moralistic, straight-laced village girl. She probably still wouldn't bathe when it was crowded. He'd have to work that out of her. Sometimes human morality was, if not inconvenient, highly illogical.

Snorting, lashing his tail a few times, Tarrin started off with his plate towards one of the dining rooms.

The mood on the Tower grounds began to get tense as the days passed. The ki'zadun was coming, and now even the Tower was openly preparing for it. The Vendari and the Knights had erected a vast breastwork and palisade that encircled the entire Tower grounds, ru

Of course, there was also good news. The Ungardt had realized that they were just getting people killed, and had broken off any more attempts to slow down the advancing army. The Aeradalla scouts had reported that the Ungardt were about a day ahead of the ki'zadun, on a forced march to Suld. That meant that there would be even more Ungardt there to defend the city, joining their brothers and sisters who were getting drunk in the city's pubs every night and causing almost as much chaos as the impending army might if they were within the walls themselves. Another bit of good news was that the Selani had finally made their presence known, absolutely a