Mai stood in the moonlit forest, Broken a few feet in front of her. A road winded through the trees, but it was small, ill-kept, empty, and at least a couple dozen paces away. A campfire burned from them at a similar distance, and near that, a sleeping body huddled. Mai and Broken had been standing here, doing nothing, for a good few minutes now, maybe more.

Then, at last, Broken spoke. “What do you see around you?” he asked.

“We are in a forest, and it is night,” Mai replied. “I hear the chirping of crickets, and I think perhaps I see the shadow of an owl, in the distance.” She included the last two parts because she had no idea what Broken meant by his question, and because of that, wanted to say as much as she could.

“I know for a fact, that this forest’s name is Redwood,” said Broken. “It is not named for any of the trees, but for a battle that took place here, many centuries ago. Now, tell me why what I just said is irrelevant to our current situation.”

Mai thought, and the answer came to her, surprisingly easily. “Because the fact that we are in Redwood Forest is not tangible, as opposed to what I told you. Everything I mentioned could be seen or heard or felt or touched.”

“Correct,” said Broken.

“So, when will you stop testing my patience?” asked Mai. “I would like to learn something this night.”

“It is amazing how insightful you can be in one regard, and how clueless you are in another,” said Broken. “We are all like that, but it is still amazing.”

Mai fought a strange urge to stamp her foot, something she had always done in Occluded City when servants were failing to do something the way she wanted. “So then, when?”

“You fool,” said Broken lightly, without any anger in his words. “We are already learning how to fight. In order to do that effectively, you must pay attention to all things around you.”

Suddenly, Mai realized what Broken’s previous statement had meant, and she did very much feel like a fool. “Why?” she asked. Mai thought she might already be coming up with an answer on her own, but she wanted to test Broken’s reaction.

“Because you can turn your surroundings against your enemies,” said Broken. He did not seem at all angry at her for asking the question. “You, Mai, can demonstrate very easily. Run at me, as fast as you can, and try to knock me over.”

Mai blinked at him. There wasn’t much she could do more unladylike than that, and while she was by no means following the Codes of Sara anymore, there were still some things she just couldn’t do.

But then Mai’s eyes narrowed. What was ladylike or not didn’t matter for Broken. And he deserved to be knocked down a peg.

And so Mai ran at him. For a moment, she saw a brief smile on Broken’s face, and then, suddenly, she was face down on the ground, her clothes covered in dirt and bramble. For the first time, Mai was glad she was wearing commoner clothes, as opposed to an Imperial dress. It would have been ruined.

Mai twisted, stuck in something, and looked up. Broken stood over her. “How did you do that?” she asked.

“Simple,” said Broken. “I used my surroundings to their best advantage. Look at you legs.”

Mai did so, and saw that her legs were caught in a low-lying bush, that she surmised had been hidden from her because of the shadows. The bush had grown in a place about halfway between where she and Broken had stood.

Mai automatically started to protest. “But you didn’t do anything,” she said. “It was the bush!”

“And that,” said Broken, “is what proves my point.” After a beat, he helped Mai from the ground.

“So, now what?” said Mai, brushing herself off. She felt much less cocky, now that she had failed twice in a row.

“First, I want you to note that that terrain would not have hindered you, had you been less distracted,” said Broken. “To fight, one must pay attention not only to what lies around them, but to their enemies’ minds. I used your own mind against you, by the process of my goading. To fight, transcend your own mind, and bring the enemies back to theirs.”

“What does that mean?” asked Mai.

“To put it simply, do not doubt the power of the mind,” said Broken. “Many a trained warrior will drop his blade and run, if you do something that reminds him well enough that he is in a life and death situation, and one small mistake could cost him everything he ever knew.”

Mai tried to take that all in. It was difficult. After a minute or so, Broken continued.

“Now we can move on to more conventional methods of teaching,” he said. Broken drew his sword slowly from its sheath, and its brilliant steel shimmered in the dim light.

It was elegant. The blade itself was etched with runes of a different tongue. Mai knew the letters spelled out words in the High Tongue, but she was not comfortable with the language, so she could not read what was written.

Broken saw at what Mai was looking. “Avia brazen poret isa dra secorpum.” he read, revealing to Mai that he, a lowly commoner, could decipher runes that Mai could not.

Still, Mai didn’t feel too bad. It was Broken’s sword, after all. Maybe he had asked a sage what the words on the sword he had been given meant. It was quite rare for a sword to have words on it, and so he may well have been curious enough one day to seek a sage out.

“Do you know what you said means in the low tongue?” asked Mai. Even now that the words were spoken, she found that she could not. She knew little of the High Tongue, but had expected what was written to be a common phrase, such as ‘victory in battle.’ She should have known that the sword, like Broken, would be much more complicated than she first thought.

“Of course I know,” said Broken. “But I will not tell you. What is written on my blade was a secret a millennium in the making. Now, my sword is called Aurasing. Take it.” And so he handed Mai the magnificent blade, greater than any she would have before thought a commoner could get his hands on.

Mai had never seen the blade clearly before, and now she saw Aurasing looked like nothing less than a relic from a different age. It was heavy, but she turned it over in her hands, careful not to cut herself. The style the sword was constructed in was unlike any she had seen before. The sword’s cross-guard was not a horizontal bolt of steel, as almost all swords Mai had seen were made like, but instead, the cross-guard was shaped as an oval.

“How did you get this?” Mai asked. “How could a commoner warrior get a sword clearly made long ago?” And yet, as if to spite her, the blade’s edge seemed unblemished by age, as if it was new.

“There is much you do not know about me,” said Broken. “There are some things you may not yet wish to hear.”

“Did you steal the sword?” asked Mai, with suspicion.

“No,” said Broken.

Mai tried to ask the question again, but in a different way, but Broken rebuffed her. When she tried a third time, he changed the topic.

“Do you know how to hold my sword at the ready?” he asked.

Mai shifted the sword so that it was vertical, held it with both hands, and shifted her stance so that the blade could be more easily accommodated, just as she had seen warriors do time and time again.

Broken came over to her, and corrected Mai’s exact posture. To her excitement, however, she had been mostly right. Hours upon hours of time that her father had made her spend watching military parades had finally paid off.

Broken took what felt as much time to carefully show her how to properly chop the sword, but Mai endured.

Another hour or so was spent learning and then endlessly practicing basic sword drills. When Broken finally took Aurasing back, and told Mai to get to sleep, she was tired and sore.

I’ll feel better in the morning, Mai told herself.

She dreamed that night.

Broken stood on a bridge over a pit of fire. But he did not look terrified. He drew his shining blade. Then Mai realized she was some kind of creature, loping at him over the bridge. She was big, and she was monstrous. When she came nearer to him, an emotion filled his face, but it was not fear.

He was laughing. He was happy. “You think that’s all you can do, dream girl,” he said. “But if you were me, you could do so much more.” Then he jumped a hundred feet in the air, and when he landed, he was a Nari, lightly cloaked. The Redwood Forest was all around them. And Mai was human once more.

“I am not who I once was,” said the snake. “This is said by dying ember’s light. If you go to Asan Paril, you will be putting yourself in needless danger. Stay put, and we will find you.”

Then there was a flash of light, and Mai was a monster again, facing off against Broken on the bridge across the ring of fire. “Goodbye, Mai darling,” he said, laughing at the play on words.

Then suddenly, Mai realized she was dreaming. “Who are you?” she screamed at him, knowing full well the only answer would be from her mind.

“In this place, whatever I want to be,” said Broken. “Whatever I want to be. It is a misnomer that the mind is the one safe place people have. Does this look safe to you?”

And suddenly Mai was off the bridge, and falling. “This is the safety of Asan Paril,” said the Nari, who suddenly was falling beside her. “Danger wrapped in a friendly face. Do not go. DO NOT GO!” the thing shrieked.

And then Mai hit the lava. All became black, except for a tiny whisper, in Broken’s voice. “And you should take heed because we are real, my darling. You think you know this, but you do not truly believe. We are real…” And then there was silence, and Mai found herself very suddenly--

Awake.

Mai panted with a sudden lack of breath, as she lay on her bed of fallen leaves and brush. As her eyes began to focus, she saw that both Broken and Ishad knelt over her, looking concerned. Through the trees, the sun was high in the sky.

“How are you feeling?” asked Ishad.

Mai’s only response was a moan and a grunt.

“I think she’s sick,” said Ishad to Broken.

Broken held a hand to Mai’s neck for a moment, as her vision swam. “Not the case,” said Broken. “But she should get up.”

As Ishad asked, “What do you mean by that?” Broken reached down, grabbed Mai by her shirt, and hauled her to her feet in a quick motion. Suddenly even more disoriented, Mai began to stumble and nearly fell. Broken caught her before that could happen.

“Are you with us?” he asked her.

“I think so,” Mai said hesitantly, half expecting him to turn into a snake. But she knew in her heart that she was awake, and Broken’s form was solid. “I had a dream,” she said. “An incredibly vivid one.”

“We know,” said Ishad. “You were mumbling things, and then you said very clearly, ‘Do not go.’ Do you know what you were dreaming about?”

A cry so loud it pierced the dream entirely, thought Mai. “Things,” she said. “Odd things.” Mai remembered what she had dreamed of perfectly, but she had a sudden hesitation to speak about it. “I’m fine now,” she said, which seemed to reassure both of them.

They had a morning meal, and then the three of them began to ride north. Mai, however, long after she awoke, continued to have the sensation that something was horribly wrong.