The voyage from Varravar to Hawsi was as rainy as expected. As Devran had told them on their departing journey, the Sweltering Water and the Pit were places on Gethra where humidity reached its highest; it rarely stopped forming droplets in the air. During most such lulls, the top deck of the Wayward Traverse became a popular location for the travellers to gather. Grendar would train his warriors; Devran would remove his sweaty shirt and relax, to ponder and occasionally make notes in his notebook; and Nill would speak with members of the crew, watch the guards fight, or read from a tattered book she had trade for in Varravar. Rain or relief, Aralim contemplated the Path and the visions he had seen under the lake of Maga.
The rain let up for a few hours as they sailed along the black-rock beaches of the marshy peninsula and Aralim used the time to let his mind replay his recent visions in the Eye of Maga. He sat cross-legged at the bow of the ship and rested his charred staff across his lap. A large amount of what he had seen would benefit from further insight in Rema, either from Rattar or Tag’na himself.
The man made of iron was a clear connection to Rema, but Aralim doubted the Emperor would leave the capital. It could be symbolic, he thought. If it was a specific person, Aralim would consider the man of iron to be Rattar or himself. As he pondered the possibility of himself becoming so influential in Rema to be considered a man of imperial iron, he compared two moments with the Emperor from the previous year.
Aralim recalled the time he told Tag’na that he would surpass him, despite their vastly different histories. This thought led him to remember yet again about their conversations before he had left Rema, when Aralim had asked who was more powerful if Aralim was capable of making the Emperor more powerful.
It was a problematic conundrum for a Walker of the Path. Progress on the Path was marked by indifference for one’s lesser; it did not account for making one’s lesser somehow stronger.
“May I join you?”
The question started Aralim out of his meditation. It was Nill, standing nearby in a flowing black wrap dress. She smiled.
Aralim obliged her with a nod and she sat down behind him, mimicking his posture as she got situated.
After a few moments, she interrupted his thoughts again. “I’ve been thinking about the Path lately. There’s some tenants of it that don’t make sense to me. I’m not trying to change your beliefs or degrade them, mind you.”
“I was just thinking about that myself,” Aralim breathed.
“About the Path? Or that it doesn’t always make sense?” She winked playfully.
Aralim allowed a smile. “A little of both. I feel as though I’m on the brink of a very important realization.”
“Oh. Well, that sounds significant,” Nill said quietly. She looked back out at the sea to the south of them. It was a glance to Aralim’s left-side, so he couldn’t see her expression, only the angle of her right cheekbone and small, blue button-earring. “Maybe now’s not the best time to pester you with questions.”
Aralim chuckled. “It’s a wonderful time,” he assured her.
Nill regarded him hesitantly, but then fell promptly into her tangential thoughts. “I don’t understand how progress on the Path and this increased power you dream of…. How does that prohibit compassion? We just witnessed Maga heal our friend because you felt pity and sadness and a hope for healing. What other reason or purpose is there to have power, than to concern yourself in some way—good or bad—with those below or above you?”
“I suppose it would be terribly unfair for me to say, ‘I don’t know,’ but there is a difference between lack of compassion and indifference,” Aralim pointed out. “The Eye has been healing people for centuries. It has seen worse than Lerela’s condition and it will again. I find it unlikely that compassion is the reason it healed her. It also only partially healed her, which raises even more questions…”
Nill considered what he had said for a few moments. The spreading waters under the bow splashed as ship cut across the tide and closer to the Pit. “You’re right. They could be unrelated,” Nill replied. “But even the other examples you have given are a matter of perspective. You could argue that the sea capsizes a ship because it is a careless spirit that occasionally desires to move that way, as easily as you could argue that the sea is a spirit striving to keep the waters calm whenever a ship is not capsized. I have no disagreements with the spectrum of minute to immense power that the Path understands to exist, but I have yet to see a human whose power or lack of power is at all separated from those around them.”
“I think by ‘I have never seen a human whose power or lack thereof is at all separated from those around them’, you mean that no one of any level of social power has failed to associate with you: heir to the 10th Queb of Tal’lashar.” Aralim looked at her slyly, but then brought his point further. “Nobles are always separated from the laymen. In every land I have travelled, there are guards at the gates to nobles’ houses. They may take care of their people, but they care not to associate with them.”
Nill shrugged. She locked her brown eyes on his and debated, “But the guards are specifically there out of concern. If the leaders had no fear and were indifferent for those around them, why even bother putting guards at the gate?”
A shadow gull, with a wide wingspan and a fish clenched in its talons, flew screaming over the masts of their ship, interrupting their conversation. Aralim smiled. Everywhere he looked, he saw the Path.
Aralim looked back to his friend. “I think you are comparing people to extremes, but as you said, it is a matter of perspective. May I share one of my new perspectives with you?”
“Please do,” Nill said with a grin.
“I am struggling with something similar to your question. Traditionally, we believe that, while you may walk with others along the Path, your ultimate goal is to surpass them. However, I’ve been contemplating what it would mean if you helped others proceed on the Path regardless of your own standing. Dullah is a fine example. She had been satisfied with her life in Rema—at ease with her stagnation—but I helped her regain her drive for power. What does that say about my place on the Path?”
Though he posed only that example, Aralim also considered Miresh. She had come so far during their time together: from orphaned beggar to Grand Mage’s apprentice. And Hayan had gone from slave to politician. Aralim had already recalled his conversations with the Emperor himself—literally everyone Aralim came into contact with grew in great strides along the Path.
Nill nodded. “I suppose even I have felt that,” she said, intrigued by Aralim’s insight. “But haven’t you, yourself, made some pretty significant progress on the Path these last few years? As I understand it, with no real qualifications, you have become a diplomat for an emperor who sounds like your personal friend—can anyone else on Gethra say the same?”
“I don’t even know if I can say that. While I consider the Emperor my friend, I doubt he has the same definitions of companionship as you or I.”
“Do you actually think you are not progressing on the Path?” Nill asked, frowning.
“It’s more that the amount of my progress does not concern me. I can’t see the Path, nor do I know how long it is.” Aralim took a deep breath. It was a significant thing for a devout Walker to confess. “I know I am leagues from where I awoke in the ashes of my village, but I have no concept of how I’ll go beyond where I am now. That’s why I just… keep walking.”
“That sounds quite vague and a little lonely,” Nill said.
Aralim blinked and looked away from her to the waves ahead. “Perhaps it is… I’ve never looked at it that way.” He looked back at her feigned innocence.
She smirked at his expression and they fell silent again.