“But why do this?” At least I’m thinking a little more clearly now that my nerves are cut off from the pain streaking my back. “I failed you.”
Faria laces my skin together with spider-silk sutures. “You followed my lessons. You stayed invisible, as much as you could, but I knew you’d be forced into conflict eventually. When you were, you didn’t hesitate. You exploited your enemies’ weaknesses. You remembered each man’s injuries, their vulnerabilities. You used them in order to defend yourself. Your fighting skills are already high caliber. Now I’ll teach you to be a master. No one will ever be able to harm you again. You’ll need that in order to face what is coming.”
“What’s coming?” I ask.
The old man gives no answer.
“You were watching the whole time?” I’m not entirely surprised. Everything, from the moment I stepped into the Wendigo, has felt like some sort of test. “Bruul and the Haulers hadn’t attacked me for over a year. Why did I warrant their attention again all of a sudden?”
“You already know the answer,” Faria says simply.
“You put them up to it.” If I had control over my body, I’d throttle him. As it is, I can only turn my head to the side. “Why?”
“We need to work out of the sights of the gangs, The Warden, and your father. I suggested to the man with the broken nose that I’d be willing to sell your services to the Haulers. He returned to Vaarkson with the offer. Vaarkson, as expected, thought he could circumvent recompense. You had been successful being invisible long enough. It was time for the next step.”
“You’ve trapped me in darkness for a year of my life! For what?” I fume.
“You’re angry?” he asks with amusement. “Good. You’re going to need that, too. But first, your real training.”
CHAPTER 20
TOCCATA
One, two, again and again. Rhythm and numbers drive my days and nights. The pulse of Gorham’s drum, the tap of The Maestro’s baton, now the relentless beat of the metal rod Faria stole from an air heating unit and now uses as a makeshift sword. In the pit of blackness, he trains me. One, two, ten, a hundred. Push-ups, sit-ups, squats, jumps. Seconds, minutes, hours, days. My muscles quiver; my brain is numb. Punch, kick.
Ho-ho! Ho-ho! Ho-hey! I am being forged.
“Feel my pressure, Edmon,” he whispers. “Don’t resist. Deflect. Keep contact. Control my center line. Use your hands. Control with your legs. A man without sight is not a man entombed. Sense with your ears. Smell changes in the air. Let your skin feel the temperature shift.”
We spar. I lose again and again. I can’t see, but my other senses become more attuned. My hands, feet, fingers, and toes grow strong. I spend hours punching and kicking the black obsidian of the cell. Faria calls this “iron hand.” Bone is damaged, then recalcifies stronger. My cells learn to expend energy more efficiently, inuring me to cold. I balance on my hands for minutes, then hours. I take a hand away; soon I’m on two fingers. Now one. Muscles tear. I’m broken down, but the master builds me back up, stoking my rage.
“Remember your mother. Remember Nadia. Remember your father and what he did to you. Remember Vaarkson and The Warden.”
Ho-ho! Ho-ho! Ho-hey!
My mother said I should forget. She was trying to protect me. I turn her words into strength. When I’m exhausted, the master teaches me to meditate inward, to visualize my cells dividing, rushing to places of need, and with conscious effort, I will myself to heal.
“This is a deeper level of awareness,” he says. “Since Ancient Earth, science has sought to transform the human. On other worlds, you will see cybernetics, narcotics like tag, or bio-mods, but evolution can occur through sheer will. Our habits determine the expression of our genes. The darkness of our surroundings will be your blindfold to heighten your other faculties. You can see them, can’t you?” he asks. “See the organisms circulating through the biosphere that is you?”
At first his words mean nothing, then I catch a glimmer of something in my inner eye. I see them just out of reach, like a dream beyond my grasp.
“You’re becoming aware for the first time,” the shaman tells me. “It takes a lifetime to achieve full control. When you’re ready, you’ll be able to do things you never thought possible.”
“Such as?” I ask.
“Run for hundreds of kilometers without stopping. Stay awake without sleep for weeks on end. Lift weight that many would deem inhuman. Appear dead to all but the most sensitive of instruments. Some claim that you can even stop yourself from dying.”
“Are you saying I could become immortal?” I ask.
I feel him smile enigmatically in the darkness. “The body’s energy is a symphony, but it is not infinite. Take a resource from your wind section, give it to percussion, and you change the sound of the orchestration. Turn the volume up on one vibration at the expense of another.”
“If I divert my focus from one thing, I won’t be able to do another?” I ask.
“Everything has a cost.” He puts it bluntly. “Sometimes the cost is too great and where you least expect it.”
Ho-ho! Ho-ho! Ho-hey!
We take respite when Goth, the lumbering, slothlike monster of the Citadel, makes his rounds to bring food. The rattle of his shackles lets us know that he’s near. There are no days or evenings. It’s a black abyss of an existence. I usually take rest after the meal, so I tend to think of the meal as supper. Faria returns to his own cell through the ventilation system. Otherwise time flows on unmarked and without end. Minutes, hours, days, weeks. Tick. Tick. Tick. It becomes interminable and undeterminable.
Through our meditations, I’m able to fully recover from intense training more quickly than ever. I push my muscles to perform greater and greater physical feats. I jump higher and move faster, but I’m forced to sleep for long stretches. I wake only to consume food.
Then Faria trains me to stay up without sleep. I feel like a zombie and cannot train with any exertion. This is how he teaches me the delicate balance of the body. I break past barriers but also learn limitations. We are hardware, and improvements are incremental but still bounded.
I learn to divert cells in my body, manipulate meridians, but I can’t grow stronger without external force. Faria provides it. Evolution bred this intuition into every organic cell long ago—adapt or die. I harness this instinct through sheer will, but like so many things in nature, when the human brain interferes, there can be deadly consequences.
One day, Faria forces me into a series of agility maneuvers using his metal rods. He swings them like an expert sword dancer. I summon newfound speed to avoid the attacks, pushing beyond the point of exhaustion. Jump over this swing. Dive under the next. Faria is so unpredictable, so attuned to my rhythms and expert at challenging them that I am at my limits far more than I ever was with an automaton. It’s exhilarating, stretching my body in ways I never thought possible.
This is what I’m capable of. It must be what Phaestion feels every day of his life.