Nemuba was an incredibly strict teacher. She reminded Nicos a great deal of his father, with her no-nonsense manner and her unflinching expectation of success. Less than an hour into the class, he found himself feeling a sense of fond nostalgia as she loudly lectured a neighboring child. The feeling only increased when, upon noticing his slight smile, the old woman pounced on him.

"Enjoying yourself, dear guest?" the old woman asked, her voice cracking like a whip. "How far have you progressed on the exercise?"

The exercise in question was a form of Memory reading unlike anything the boy had ever considered. The Neru thought of the basic ability to read Memory much the same as an underdeveloped muscle. They trained it, teaching their children from a young age to expand this innate ability into something well beyond its original scope.

"The desert," Nemuba had explained, "is merely a collection of sand. A million, million grains, all coming together, to form something greater. But each grain is the desert, and the desert is each grain. Through one, we can know all."

The children might have 'ooh'ed and 'ahh'ed over the old woman's mysterious words, but the boy had seen the real purpose of her speech. It had made a connection, in the children's minds, between the sand and the desert in its entirety. The Naru could read the Memory of the entire desert. They could do it with nothing more than a touch, and a grain of sand.

No wonder they had developed a technique to pull one's self-identity back together. Nicos wondered just how many of their scouts had lost their minds using this technique. How many had dove in, unprepared, and drowned beneath millennia of Memory, hidden in the trillions of grains of sand?

Nemuba clearly understood the risks. It was Nicos' understanding that the children beside him had been training for a full season, yet their orders were incredibly specific. They were to read the Memory of the training grounds, and only the training grounds, that they were practicing in.

But what was a training ground? Simply a patch of earth, given a designation. The Naru created a new one, every time that they moved. Its existence began when they set up camp, and ended when they left. A turn or two, at most. The Memory was fleeting. The children could not possibly be overwhelmed.

It was an interesting conceptual trick. Nicos really wished he hadn't noticed it. It probably would have made things easier on him.

"I'm struggling," he admitted sourly, letting his knuckle brush the desert floor.

Nothing.

He rose from his squat, smacking his hands together to knock free the sand. "All I can read is grains."

Nemuba eyed him critically. "Hm. But are those grains not a part of the greater whole?"

Nicos shrugged helplessly. "It's just sand, Nemuba. Sand is sand."

"Nothing is just anything," the old woman snapped, flicking him on the forehead like he was a child. "Everything is connected, and everything is arbitrary. A desert is nothing more than a collection of sand, given a name. A training ground is nothing more than a clearing given purpose. Your clothes," she tapped the back of her hand against his chest, "this shirt, it is animal hide, soaked and treated, sewed and cut. Yet, if I were to tell you to read the Memory of your shirt, would you see the history of the animal, or the history of your shirt? Is there a difference? And why? Why should it be one, and not the other?"

His brow furrowed, as her rant triggered a Memory.

"Everything is connected," Eurya had once told him. Like a grand web, weaving the world together. Touch was simply a way of filtering those connections, albeit a necessary one. No mind could survive the combined weight of existence's Memory.

He had used this theory to connect to Eurya's Memory through his sword. He'd nearly cracked his brain like an egg, but it had worked. He struggled to view the training field as one object, but perhaps he could view it as many objects, all connected. Nicos could see the links in the chain, one into another into another. This was something he could do. He could follow that chain.

Nemuba eyed him as his eyes unfocused.

"Figured something out, I see," she commented wryly. "Well done. You've almost reached the level of children half your age."

The boy smiled back at her. "Thank you, Nemuba, for your advice."

"Bah." The grumpy old woman waved him off, turning to glare at another student.

The boy laughed, and fell back into a crouch. He needed to practice.

"Let your feet glide across the sand," Urz said, demonstrating the motion. The young scout practically floated over the desert floor, his feet leaving only the slightest trail. "The desert shifts, constantly. The wind, the pull of the earth, the creatures beneath the surface. Its Memory is ever in motion. Use your own Memory of these movements, let it flow into the desert, and direct the motion. The desert will not fight you."

The pair were on a dune overlooking the village, as Urz attempted to teach Nicos the Naru's method of traversing the desert.

It was casting, Nicos quickly realized. These nomads, these savages, as his people would call them, used a form of Memory manipulation that Farathun barely even knew existed. They were taught, from the time that they could walk, to cast the Memory of motion into the desert. It was effortless for them. Done without thought. Completely mundane.

To Nicos, it was fucking magic. The kind straight out of myth, like those old tales of the Ancients, when gods and titans still roamed the world in huge numbers. Old legends of figures who could throw lightning and wield fire and drown entire civilizations with water conjured from thin air. In retrospect, those stories were probably about talented casters, blown wildly out of proportion. He could see that now, after training with Eurya.

But still. Magic!

The Keeper had deemed him unfit for casting, but that was before. Before Nicos had reaffirmed his own identity, before he'd spent days in the desert, before he'd been capable of fully acknowledging his own insecurities. Perhaps he wasn't up to the Keeper's exacting standards but, by the gods, if a child could do this, so could Nicos!

He gently pressed his foot down on the sand, pulling on his Memory of the shifting grains. The desert was always in motion. He remembered a dune collapsing beneath a mighty roc. He remembered the sand shifting as he walked. He remembered the wind, rustling the surface.

He took a step—he remembered tripping, tumbling, falling down because of unsteady footing—and cursed as he tumbled down the dune.

Urz slid down beside him, chuckling merrily. "A fine effort, my friend."

The boy flopped over to face the sky, and snarled, "Fucking sand! Ground is supposed to be firm! Why can't it just hold still!?"

"Sand can be firm," Urz replied with a laugh. "Not here, but there are places where the ground is hard and unforgiving. The sand compacts until it can hold any amount of weight."

"I wish I'd ended up there," the boy groaned.

Urz slapped his shoulder in good cheer. "But then you would not have met the Naru! And you would probably have been eaten by a roc!"

NIcos shoved the tribesman, and rolled his eyes as his older companion skated across the sand. The boy stood back up, brushing himself off.

"Is this a common technique?" he asked.

"Among the desert tribes," Urz answered. "As for Outsiders..." He paused. "The elders have spoken of raiding parties from Bastion who skate across the sand. I've never seen one since becoming a scout, but it is my understanding that the ability is not entirely unknown to them. It would be nearly impossible for them to ever catch us, were it not."

Nicos eyed the man's feet speculatively. Even while standing still, he seemed to drift, slightly. It seemed that it was not as steady as he'd once assumed.

"Can you fight like that?" he asked. "It seems like it would be difficult."

Urz shrugged. "It is sufficient for hunting."

"But not battle," Nicos stated.

"That is not our way."

"Of course." It was still an incredibly useful technique, but something deep inside Nicos balked at compromising his footwork. "Is it possible to adapt the technique? Use it to harden the sand? It wouldn't be as fast, but it would let you actually brace."

Urz frowned. "I've stood on solid ground maybe twice in my life. I've few Memories to use. Certainly not enough to overcome the desert's natural tendency for movement."

"But I've lived my whole life on solid ground," the boy mused. His brow furrowed. "Hmm. Well that's an idea."

"You could try chanting a mantra?" Urz suggested. "Some of the children use it when they are first learning the technique. It helps focus the Memory and push away distractions. I've even had to use it, once or twice, when caught in a sandstorm."

The boy laughed. "Chant what? 'The ground is slippery'? That would likely make things worse." He shook his head. "No, my friend. My Memory is not the same as yours, nor your kin. I'll find another way."