Faint amusement lines his lips. ‘You are flattering me again.’ His Spring of Heavens affinity pulls water from the air before his hand hovers above my own. Quickly, I decrease my bonds, making the water stream uselessly through my fingers. He frowns.
‘It did not work. We cannot create steam.’
‘Then increase your bonds,’ he suggests too patiently.
‘To what extent?’
He crosses his arms and cocks his head. ‘Are you a pazktab student unable to do basic bond expansion?’
I lift my hand before producing a swathe of nur, his features wavering beyond the bright curtain. ‘Will this do?’
He peers at it and nods before extracting more water from the air. ‘This will be your first battle, yes?’ he asks absent-mindedly.
I think of Tezmi’a, and then the capital Navia. ‘No. But it’s the first I am willingly partaking in.’
‘Then see it as a history lesson.’
My eyes narrow. ‘People will die; that is not a history lesson.’
He almost smiles. ‘Not for the first time. This continent is founded on war. The pathetic thing about our history is that we coexist because no one was strong enough to conquer the other, not because we agreed to coexist.’
‘I think the Easkaria is enough to teach me, though Scholar Mufasa is my least favoured tutor.’ I sound bitter.
He smiles now. ‘Mine too.’
I glance at the small smile, and then away before looking again. It hits me that we are in Ghaznia again, like this. He notices. ‘What makes you stare like that?’
‘I am only thinking.’
‘Of?’
‘A monk.’
He slows in pulling water. ‘Do I continue prying answers, or will you answer less obtusely?’
I regret my honesty and decide a half-truth would appease him instead. ‘I am thinking of how I thought you were a monk and how absurd that is now.’
He remembers and appraises me carefully. ‘You assumed it. Though I wonder, you seem more provoked by this rather than the fact that I had your leg snapped in half.’
‘A broken leg I can take.’
‘And more,’ he says, holding my gaze.
Remembering that for him I am a mere low-rank, I step back. ‘Forgive this underling, my Sepahbad.’
Ending the matter, he lifts his hand. I stare at my trembling fingers below his. The water clashes and hisses into thin clouds, obscuring the room.
‘Steam,’ he muses.
‘Who would have thought?’ My insides knot, reminded of his bone-seal.
‘We’ll be outnumbered three to one. As they dissect the troops with the bow formation, we’ll create steam before the archers engage. For the enemy, a blind retreat.’
‘Yes, Sepahbad.’
He studies me through the steam, still amused. ‘Who would have thought,’ he repeats back.
Before I leave, his gaze flits to the space between us as if he sees an abstract thing that is out of my reach. He has done this often. Not for the first time, I wonder what he actually sees that I cannot. I hope I am not blind to this truth too.
