The Talented (18 page)

“
We had no way of knowing
that about you before meeting you,” Ben said. “And I don’t believe
you to be a stupid. In fact, it’s vital that you
aren’t.”

“
Why?”

“
So you didn’t figure out
everything after today.” He smiled. “You already know that everyone
who was able to develop an ability was part of a difficult
professions. Now tell me what those professions have in
common.”

“
Discipline.”

“
And?”

Adrienne hesitated. “It
takes continuous effort to improve?”

“
Study, yes.
And?”

Adrienne thought about it
and finally had to admit defeat. “I don’t know.”

“
Intelligence. There are no
stupid healers, or scholars. Blacksmiths need to know when and
where to strike the metal to get the desired result, and how to
quench the metal afterwards. Weavers need to know how to dye wool
for the most vibrant colors, and how to work the yarn without
weakening it.”

“
I suppose.”

“
The training and
intelligence needed in these professions is unique. You cannot
train yourself to be a healer; you have to learn. And we have
discovered that you cannot train yourself to develop these
abilities, either.”

“
You did.”

Ben looked embarrassed.
“It took a long time, and I wasn’t truly teaching myself. I read
the journals, developed theories, worked with the other scholars
and commissioners. And it was still a miracle that I was able to
develop an ability at all.”

“
Sometimes miracles and
luck are enough.”

“
Paired with dedication.
And now that you know more about what it takes to develop one of
these abilities, do you think I will I be able to train you?” He
looked concerned, and as if he did not realize that his questions
could be taken as insults. “It hasn’t worked on any of the guards
we’ve attempted to train.”

Adrienne barely resisted
the urge to show him just how different her skills were from those
of the insipid guards she’d seen on the gate. “I’ve a bit more
dedication and training than the guards.”

“
Very good then. Since you
seem to have a good idea of the apparent requirements of developing
an ability, maybe it is best to begin the next stage of your
training,” Ben said. They were nearing the southern end of
Kessering, where beyond the city walls civilization gave way once
more to grassland.

“
How do we begin?” Adrienne
asked, willing for the moment to set aside trying to convince Ben
that soldiers did not by nature lack intelligence.

“
One of the most essential
steps in your training will be the ability to enter into a state of
Oneness.”

“
Oneness?” Adrienne
asked.

Ben blushed. “That is what
I call it. Some of the others with abilities have taken to calling
it that as well, although the commission doesn’t like us naming
things. When you achieve that state, you feel like you are one with
everything. The trees, the grass, the sun. Everything just
feels…”

“
Connected?” Adrienne
asked.

“
Exactly,” Ben said. “How
did you know?”

Adrienne nearly rolled her
eyes, a habit she had broken years ago but felt coming back now.
“Asmov wrote about people with special abilities being connected to
the universe. I had wondered what he meant, until you started
talking about Oneness. Is it the same thing?”

Ben nodded. “I remember
that, of course.” He tapped a finger against his temple and
laughed. “There was a lot of argument about what Asmov meant there.
Some of the commissioners thought that those people must be
essentially different than the rest of us; that the connection to
the universe couldn’t be taught and must have been lost forever
over the years. We almost didn’t try, but there were some, myself
included, that thought perhaps that connection was not inborn but
could be learned.”

“
And it can be,” Adrienne
said. “You learned.” Although his ability was hardly one that
Adrienne had thought about, she realized now that Ben truly was one
of the Talented. They no longer existed only in her mind and in the
pages of an old book. “Tell me more about this Oneness.”

“
After reading Asmov’s
journal, Oneness is really the first step in your training.
You—”

“
Wait, explain this to me
first. Why did I have to read Asmov’s journal.”

Ben seemed surprised by
the question. “Because that was the beginning of
everything.”

“
I don’t understand. It’s
hardly about Talents at all.”

“
But it’s the first one we
found that talked about them. Without Asmov’s journal, we wouldn’t
know anything about people with abilities, or Oneness, or any of
that.”

“
Even so, the people you’re
training don’t need to know it. You could tell them everything they
need to know and more. You know more than Asmov ever wrote about.”
It was clear from Ben’s expression that it had never occurred to
him that the people he was training didn’t have to read the book.
“You’re a scholar,” she said, “you want to know the history of it
all. But it isn’t necessary, not for everyone.”

Ben looked unconvinced,
and she decided to save that discussion for a different day. “Tell
me about Oneness.”

“
You have to focus,” Ben
said, clearly grateful for the more comfortable topic. “You have to
learn to block everything else from your mind until it is just you
and nature and nothingness, no intruding thoughts or feelings.”
Ben’s voice took on a smooth, lecturing quality as he spoke. His
shoulders were no longer hunched, his voice no longer hesitant. It
was amazing how much more confident he seemed in that moment. “It
is just you and nature, and eventually you will realize that you
are not a separate being; you are one with everything around
you.”

His eyes had a distant
look, as if they were seeing something that was not really there.
Adrienne wondered if he was experiencing Oneness at that moment.
Surely something had caused such a change.

She pursed her lips in
thought. “How do I do all that?” she asked. It seemed like a lot of
things to do while trying not to think about anything.

Ben smiled apologetically,
his eyes focusing on Adrienne, and he seemed once again to grow
smaller; whatever change had occurred slipping away. “I tend to get
carried away. You start by just clearing your mind. Most people
find that it helps to sit out here, away from the distractions in
the city. Try sitting down with your eyes closed.”

Adrienne gave a little
laugh and went to sit under the lone
pago
tree a hundred feet away. “Just
sit here with my eyes closed?” she called. It seemed ridiculous,
and a waste of time. Surely there were other means of
training.

The thought made her think
of Jeral, and the doubts he had voiced about her training methods
at the beginning, especially the meditative moves she had made him
learn and practice every morning. The young soldier had seen no
purpose in them, but he had been wrong, and Adrienne thought she
might be unfairly judging Ben as well.

The young Talented scholar
had trained others; surely he knew what he was doing.

“
Yes. Try to clear your
mind,” Ben reminded her. “I can join you, or I can leave if you’d
rather be alone.”

“
Since I doubt I’ll achieve
Oneness in the hour or so before dark, you might as well go,”
Adrienne said. She’d feel awkward enough without Ben sitting there,
waiting to see what happened. If this required concentration, she
thought she’d have a better chance of succeeding if Ben was not
there watching her.

“
I’ll see you tomorrow
morning then,” Ben said cheerily. “Good luck.”

Ben left, and Adrienne
concentrated on not thinking.

••••••

“
I can’t do it,” Adrienne
told Ben. She had been working on clearing her mind and achieving
Oneness for over a week, and the closest she had come was falling
asleep under the thick branches of the
pago
tree. Her mind had been clear
then, but there had been no connection to the universe
involved.

“
You have to give it time,”
Ben told her. “It takes some people months to reach Oneness for the
first time. You’ve only been at it for nine days.”

Adrienne resumed her
pacing. They were in Ben’s room at the library. The room was much
larger than Adrienne’s room at the inn, but filled as it was with a
desk, overflowing bookshelves, and more books scattered on chairs
and stacked on the floor, it seemed much more cramped than her own
small room. “I’m not making any progress,” she told Ben, her voice
sounding perilously close to a whine. “Every time I try, I think
more and more.” The task of clearing her mind hadn’t seemed so hard
when Ben had first explained it. How hard could not thinking
be?

It turned out to be much
harder than Adrienne had anticipated. She would have understood if
her progress had been slow—training in various disciplines over the
years had taught her that, despite her natural aptitudes, not
everything came easily to her. Still, there had always been some
sign of progress, no matter how small, to encourage her to train
more, study harder. “I don’t think it’s going to work,” she said.
“I sit there and my mind runs through different scenarios and my
body gets all twitchy.” She exhaled hard through her nose. “It’s
not calming.”

Ben was quiet, but his
expression was one that Adrienne was familiar with. He wore it when
he was thinking hard about something. She hoped whatever thought he
was having would be helpful.

At length, Ben turned to
her, eyeing her athletic body covered in functional leathers and
the sword at her hip. “Maybe all of your training makes it hard for
you to just sit with your eyes closed,” he said. “You’re always
looking for signs of trouble, even when you’re somewhere
safe.”

Adrienne stopped her
unconscious scan of the room and looked at Ben. She had not even
realized she had been checking the room for signs of danger. Doing
so was as instinctual as breathing. “So what do I do?” She refused
to think that this first setback would keep her forever from
reaching her goal. She had never given up before, and she was not
about to start now, when supernatural abilities were within her
reach.

“
Is there anything you do
that does clear your mind?” Ben asked. “Maybe sitting is the
problem. You never do it.”

Since Adrienne was
standing now, and typically chose to stand or lean against the wall
when she and Ben were talking, she knew he had a point. Adrienne
thought about the calm state that settled over her before a fight,
that moment when everything ceased to exist but her and her
opponent. Time, in that moment, ceased to have meaning. But she
knew that was not what Ben meant. Although her mind was calm, void
of any emotions or distractions that could interfere with her
ability to fight, it was not empty. In that timeless moment before
a fight, Adrienne’s mind was filled with clear, precise thoughts.
It was not Oneness as Ben described it. When she was in that
timeless moment before a fight, she was not connected with the
universe. She was connected only with her own body and that of her
opponent.

She was about to tell Ben
no when she remembered the smooth, controlled moves of her morning
routine. On the surface, it was the complete opposite of sitting in
a field with her eyes closed—every part of her was active as she
went through the meditative motions she had learned from Karse in
childhood. But when she focused on her breathing, on her balance
and the smooth transition from pose to pose, her mind was silent.
Despite her eyes being closed, she was always aware of herself and
the small changes and steady permanence of her surroundings. “Yes,”
she told him.

“
Yes?” Ben asked, surprise
coloring his voice. “You already know how to clear your mind and
never mentioned it?” He didn’t sound entirely happy, and looked a
bit suspicious, as though Adrienne had been purposely keeping a
secret from him.

“
I do it differently than
you describe,” Adrienne said in her defense. “I didn’t connect the
two until just now.”

“
Then maybe it isn’t the
same,” Ben said, looking much less excited than he had moments ago,
but also more relaxed. Ben had always been polite, and at times
Adrienne thought they were just on the verge of friendship, but she
knew he was ever aware of the sword at her hip. Even without it,
Adrienne doubted the Talented scholar would ever forget that she
was a soldier. Despite her initial hopes, she didn’t foresee a bond
like the one she and Jeral had shared forming between her and
Ben.

It saddened her that Ben
would not trust what she said, but Adrienne had no doubts. She knew
now that the Oneness that had eluded her for days was something she
had been doing unconsciously for half her life. “I can show you
now, if you’d like.”

Ben looked around his
cluttered room, with precariously balanced stacks of books, loose
pages of parchment, abandoned quills and empty inkwells. It was not
the most soothing of atmospheres to practice clearing the mind, at
least not for the first time. “Here?”