Ki'el bare-ly no-ticed the time pass-ing, and was sur-prised when one of the times she woke up from her rest, Broth-er Du was there to lead her away. She was not en-tire-ly healed, al-though she felt bet-ter; more than any-thing, it was her poud-ing head, al-though she had also done no small dam-age to her left el-bow and shoul-der, and her back, and while heal-ing had been done to her, the wounds had not sim-ply been un-done like when she had been am-bushed be-fore.

  When Broth-er Du showed up and sim-ply com-mand-ed her to fol-low, Ki'el took a few mo-ments to stand and stretch, find-ing her-self more than sim-ply achy; her el-bow, es-pe-cial-ly, was still swollen enough that she had trou-ble mov-ing it freely, but she could fol-low, and she did. Al-though she asked, once or twice, where they were go-ing, Broth-er Du said noth-ing, and she could tell from the grim at-mos-phere around him that mat-ters were se-ri-ous.

  The path they took, as of-ten in the Moon-stone Is-land Sect, was not di-rect, but nei-ther was it long. They passed up sev-er-al bridges, though the last had to be un-furled by an In-ner Dis-ci-ple who stood wait-ing--the path formed in midair as sev-er-al stone blocks, and al-though Ki'el knew that Du, like many oth-ers, could sim-ply have flown up, she her-self could not fly.

  Well. Most-ly.

  The stones un-der her feet were as sol-id as is-lands them-selves as she moved up af-ter Du, and al-though he had said noth-ing, she had al-ready come to un-der-stand what must be hap-pen-ing, and so while she was up-set and ner-vous to find her-self on an is-land where many se-nior Sect dis-ci-ples and El-ders sat in a ring, all clear-ly await-ing her. But Ki'el formed her re-solve and, when they reached a point where Broth-er Du stepped aside and all heads turned to meet her, Ki'el sim-ply formed a mar-tial salute as best she could with her wound-ed el-bow and shoul-der and wait-ed.

  "You are Xoi Doua Ki'el, tri-al mem-ber of the Less-er House." The voice was a woman, and Ki'el glanced over, find-ing her posed in a style she would call in-for-mal, her legs out in front of her, and her weight for-ward on her el-bows as she rest-ed them on her knees. "I would ad-vise you to take this se-ri-ous-ly, young sis-ter. Mur-ders are not com-mon on the Moon-stone Isles, and we are not flip-pant in our in-ves-ti-ga-tion when one oc-curs. Step for-ward."

  Ki'el, ner-vous-ly, moved for-ward into the cen-ter of the cir-cle, aware that none of the ob-servers seemed to have much of a re-ac-tion to her pres-ence. Nor should they, Ki'el rea-soned with her-self. They are mas-ters, and I am noth-ing. She was be-gin-ning to feel a hol-low-ness in her heart, as she con-sid-ered that even this place was re-ject-ing her, choos-ing to blame her for de-fend-ing her-self. If they throw me out... can I even sur-vive be-ing thrown off of the is-land? If I can, what then?

  "Young Sis-ter Ki'el, we have so far to-day heard sev-er-al at-tempts to ex-plain the events, recre-at-ed from the ev-i-dence of the is-land it-self--the spir-its of the trees, the rocks, the wind and soil. You will tell us, in all hon-esty, whether you dis-agree with this ver-sion of events, and un-der-stand that we will be aware if there is a lie."

  Ki'el tried to flush her spir-it with aether, but found that there was some bind-ing on her, and she could not ma-nip-u-late her spir-it. She swal-lowed, and sim-ply nod-ded.

  "You ar-rived un-aware of the ex-is-tence of Sect Broth-er Kem Jee Sai, who had placed sev-er-al con-ceal-ment wards and med-i-tat-ed in the trees near a spot that you fre-quent. You per-formed cer-tain acts that the spir-its them-selves could not dis-cern, your own spir-it dis-tract-ed and per-haps con-fused, un-til the mo-ment when you were at-tacked by Sect Broth-er Sai."

  "By all ac-counts, you were thrown en-tire-ly off of the is-land."

  Ki'el swal-lowed, and since there was a long si-lence, which seemed to be filled with in-tent, she spoke. "That is all cor-rect. I was ex-am-in-ing the con-tents of my space ring, which El-der Gol had filled with items tak-en from Xan Bu."

  "That was a while ago," some-one said to her left, but Ki'el re-sist-ed the urge to turn her head, and glanc-ing with-out turn-ing showed her noth-ing.

  "I have only vis-it-ed El-der Gol twice since I ar-rived," Ki'el said. "The first time, the items tak-en from Xan Bu were still be-ing in-ves-ti-gat-ed. I have not had rea-son to re-turn."

  "Not had rea-son?" A scorn-ful voice over her right shoul-der. "He con-trols the sect points. There's hard-ly a mem-ber of the Less-er House who isn't con-stant-ly ha-rass-ing him about buy-ing pills."

  Ki'el again re-sist-ed the urge to turn, but felt com-pelled to speak. "I am not fa-mil-iar with the sect's pills; they are not some-thing my mas-ter taught me. I have been fo-cus-ing on my own mat-ters."

  There were more mut-ter-ings at that, which Ki'el did not un-der-stand, and she felt... strange, about it. Was she sup-posed to have been beg-ging for pills of some kind? Spir-it crys-tals? Did peo-ple think that was how one gained strength? If she hadn't had her aether cy-cles and qi turn-ing cy-cle, would she have been the same?

  When Ki'el of-fered no fur-ther de-fense, though, the El-der who was speak-ing con-tin-ued. "Once you were far enough from the is-land, we could find no ev-i-dence of what specif-i-cal-ly hap-pened, but it is known that you used a tech-nique that should be far above your lev-el to re-turn to the is-lands. It was far enough above your sta-tion that the de-fen-sive wards of the Is-lands picked it up as a plau-si-ble at-tack, if not one wor-thy of con-cern. It was suf-fi-cient to bring you back to where you had fall-en, and here mat-ters be-come con-fused."

  "The stones and the trees, the grass and the dirt, even the ephemer-al wind spir-its that bore wit-ness, all agree that what re-turned was not a girl, but a blade, a blade that spoke the de-sire to move to-wards its op-po-nent." The woman's voice was mat-ter of fact, but it felt heavy, laden with sig-nif-i-cance. Ki'el swal-lowed, but the woman did not yet pause for her to com-ment. "This blade moved through the Sect Broth-er Sai, who had moved for-ward to where you had been sit-ting be-fore. It cut, un-til it could cut no more, and when it could not cut, its own mo-men-tum dam-aged it, and all that re-mained be-hind was a girl." The woman's head tilt-ed to one side. "That is what the nat-ur-al spir-its of the Is-lands record, and they are all that sur-vives to tell of the events--ex-cept you."

  Ki'el looked down, but nod-ded. "I... do not know why they would all see me as a blade, ex-cept that I had that in-ten-tion, and spoke it to my sword." She paused. "The sword... is an ar-ti-fact left to me by my mas-ter. I am aware that it con-tains mys-ter-ies that I have not yet un-der-stood, but it is... only a sword."

  "You spoke your in-tent to your sword?" An-oth-er El-der spoke up, his voice not doubt-ing, but... nei-ther con-tent with her de-scrip-tion.

  Ki'el hes-i-tat-ed, but nod-ded. "I do not un-der-stand it yet. But twice when I have need-ed to use it to de-fend my-self, I have felt it wait-ing to hear my in-tent. The first time, I be-lieve I mis-un-der-stood and wast-ed it. This time, my in-tent was sim-ply that I am a blade. A blade, in the sense that those who strike at me..." she hes-i-tat-ed, los-ing her steam. What did she re-al-ly want to say? What had she in-tend-ed in the mo-ment?

  "Those who strike at a blade must be sharp-er and hard-er than it," some-one sug-gest-ed. "When two blades col-lide, one or the oth-er is cut, or both, whether it is the small-est nick or a deep gouge."

  Ki'el turned and nod-ded, grate-ful-ly, though in truth, she was still un-cer-tain.

  "And how did you re-turn to the is-land?" An-oth-er voice, from the oth-er side. "I want to know how you could pos-si-bly have done that at Gold Qi."

  Ki'el hes-i-tat-ed, but spoke. "My mas-ter also left me a... spir-i-tu-al as-sis-tant. It has helped me in small ways, and this time, she spoke to me the in-tent I need-ed to move my-self. I ex-pressed that in-tent in my qi, and spoke my will to the world."

  "Thrust," sev-er-al peo-ple echoed, not quite in synch with each oth-er, and Ki'el felt a strange mix-ture of em-bar-rass-ment and con-fu-sion come over her, but nod-ded quick-ly.

  "It beg-gars the mind," a sharp voice came from be-hind her, "to think that a child at Gold Qi could make such ef-fi-cient use of the qi you have to use such a pow-er-ful in-tent twice and still have enough pow-er left to do so much dam-age. Even if we were to sup-pose that Broth-er Sai raised no de-fens-es, it takes sub-stan-tial pow-er to cut through hu-man flesh and bone, let alone..." there was a pause, though Ki'el did not turn to look. "...the rest."

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  Ki'el paused, frown-ing, and looked up at the El-der who had been speak-ing so far. "...The rest?"

  "Are you not aware of what you did, young Sis-ter Ki'el?"

  But Ki'el sim-ply shook her head. "From the mo-ment I launched my-self at the man who at-tacked me, it was all a blur, and then I was knocked un-con-scious. In truth, my mem-o-ries from the mo-ment I was first at-tacked are con-fused. I do not have any un-der-stand-ing of what hap-pened."

  There were sev-er-al scoffs at that, and some mum-bling, but an-oth-er voice piped up. "In all hon-esty, that's one of the few be-liev-able things," he said. "If she held shields while also do-ing two oth-er things, both of which she claims are new to her, I'd sus-pect her of ei-ther be-ing a ge-nius or a liar, and more heav-i-ly fa-vor-ing the lat-ter, even here."

  There were more mum-bles and some laugh-ter at that, but Ki'el kept her eyes on the El-der who seemed to be in charge.

  The woman tilt-ed her head, but turned to look down at one of the few fa-mil-iar fig-ures. "El-der Gol, if you would."

  The man in charge of the Sect's fi-nances stood, as al-ways in no hur-ry, and moved down to the cen-ter of the cir-cle near Ki'el, in the un-hur-ried way he had--al-though, now, his eyes were closed, his at-ten-tion with-in rather than drift-ing to all of the de-tails around him. When he reached the bot-tom, he be-gan pac-ing in a cir-cle around Ki'el, as his voice sud-den-ly reached them all, car-ried pure-ly by his in-tent. [I ar-rived at the scene late,] Gol's in-tent spoke, and Ki'el could vivid-ly see the scene in her mind, her own at-ten-tion dragged over the var-i-ous de-tails of the near-by trees and stones, grass and dirt, as each caught the El-der's eye one af-ter the oth-er. [Late enough that more than six oth-ers had been there be-fore me, and four had gone, along with the girl.] His at-ten-tion swept over foot-prints, spir-i-tu-al signs, marks of in-tent left be-hind, briefly not-ing the two who re-mained, ob-serv-ing the scene.

  But Ki'el, al-though her at-ten-tion was be-ing pulled in var-i-ous di-rec-tions, only had eyes for the one de-tail that she knew had cap-ti-vat-ed the oth-ers, but of which the El-der had not yet spo-ken, nor had his wan-der-ing eyes drift-ed to.

  [I found, as de-scribed, sev-er-al items pre-vi-ous-ly owned by Xan Bu left dis-card-ed by a rock where Xoi Doua Ki'el had been sit-ting. There were traces of Gale Qi, orig-i-nat-ing not far from a cir-cle of con-ceal-ment marks, al-ready re-vealed by an-oth-er. The stones along the edge of the is-land were not touched by the girl's move-ment tech-n-qi-ue. I found that odd at first, be-liev-ing it to have been a mat-ter of con-trol.] The El-der's at-ten-tion fix-at-ed for too long away from the scene it-self, on the rocks at the edge, be-fore turn-ing. [But it be-came clear that the in-tent was sim-ply only ever on the girl her-self. She moved as she di-rect-ed her-self, rather than pulling on things or push-ing on things. It was an im-pec-ca-bly clear in-tent to [Thrust], with nu-ances I have not seen be-fore.]

  Fi-nal-ly, the El-der's own at-ten-tion on the scene that his in-tent spoke of came to the lead-ing edge of a deep cut, one that sheared ef-fort-less-ly through the large stone boul-der that Ki'el had been sit-ting on, con-tin-u-ing far deep-er than the length of Ki'el's own Aether Sword, but no wider at any point than her sword, and in many places al-ready col-lapsed. Al-though she could not be-gin to guess at the depth... she did not have to, be-cause El-der Gol's at-ten-tion was drawn to it.

  [There was a sin-gle cut from a sin-gle swing of a blade,] the El-der mused. [The pow-er used was strange, a form of qi am-pli-fied in strange ways, which spoke un-de-ni-ably about con-se-quence, but not so clear-ly that it could be un-der-stood as in-tent. In-deed, [in-tent] is the wrong word for it. The cut ex-ists as a con-se-quence, not be-cause it was in-tend-ed, and not as a mat-ter of some-thing else's na-ture. Qi was still in-volved, but that qi was re-shaped by a pow-er I do not un-der-stand.]

  [The cut ex-ceed-ed eight feet in depth at its peak, fif-teen feet in length, but only a fin-ger's width wide. The edges showed no signs of qi trans-form-ing into heat, and in-deed the qi leak-age and cor-rup-tion around the cut were min-i-mal. Only at the very end was there any sign of re-sis-tance, and here the blade's path be-came shal-low-er. At the end of the path, there was a sign of im-pact, a sin-gle body strik-ing shrubs and a tree. By that time, the girl had been re-moved for heal-ing.]

  "That's more con-cise than usu-al, El-der," some-one re-marked, and there was a smat-ter-ing of laughs around the cir-cle.

  "Do you be-lieve that the pow-er be-hind that strike was be-yond the girl's con-trol?" The voice that spoke up, much to Ki'el's sur-prise, was that of Broth-er Du, and al-though she had done her best to keep fo-cused on the peo-ple in charge of the pro-ceed-ing, she did turn to look at him, sur-prised.

  But El-der Gol hummed for a long mo-ment, and as he hummed, the sound car-ried his con-cept of the scene, though not locked in a mo-ment of time. [The length of the blade cut seems to be a mis-es-ti-ma-tion,] he said af-ter a while. [A novice fight-er's over-reach, per-haps even a case where she was un-aware her will de-ter-mined the blade's length. Giv-en the amount of cut-ting pow-er the blade had, it doubt-less could have ex-tend-ed fur-ther, but it did not. If the ar-ti-fact were sim-ply vent-ing pow-er in the form of blade qi, it would reach as far as it could. The ar-ti-fact seemed to re-main func-tion-al, per-form-ing ex-act-ly what its novice user in-tend-ed.]

  "Then it is your es-ti-ma-tion that young Ki'el can con-trol that much pow-er? At Gold Qi?"

  El-der Gol sighed, and the scene was scrubbed from Ki'el's thoughts. Then, with care and rev-er-ence, El-der Gol spoke, and in Ki'el's mind, a fa-mil-iar ob-ject ap-peared. [The item in ques-tion un-der-stands it-self as the Aether Sword. Its in-tent is for-eign to us, and speaks of a pow-er that is not qi. Con-cealed with-in it is a tech-nique from its cre-ator, which re-sist-ed my scruti-ny.] Ki'el saw it, in the men-tal im-age, and al-though its shape was un-fa-mil-iar, she felt cer-tain that what she saw was a Thorn... and there-fore, a Cy-cle, though one whose aether flow was un-fa-mil-iar to her. [Aside from that, the ar-ti-fact ap-pears to be an ex-act-ing ex-er-cise in sim-plic-i-ty. The blade it-self is formed of pow-er ac-cord-ing to sim-ple rules of geom-e-try, with chan-nels cre-at-ed to al-low qi re-in-force-ment. Its sharp-ness is as sim-ple and as bru-tal as math-e-mat-ics it-self, with no ma-te-r-i-al to bend or chip. There are ad-di-tion-al meth-ods and fea-tures, but... for all pur-pos-es, it can be un-der-stood as ex-act-ly two things: a sword, and a ves-sel for one tech-n-qi-ue of the girl's mas-ter.]

  [The ques-tion as you un-der-stand it, Sect Broth-er Mai Han Du, is whether this tech-nique of the girl's mas-ter is too pow-er-ful for her to con-trol. As it seems to be the source of the am-pli-fi-ca-tion, it is not im-plau-si-ble. How-ev-er, this cir-cum-stance seems to be one more plau-si-ble than most to have caused a sit-u-a-tion be-yond the girl's con-trol. Am-bushed alone, she was pan-icked, ter-ri-fied, wrath-ful. She was un-aware of her mas-ter's tech-nique and seemed to ac-ti-vate it un-know-ing-ly or by in-stinct. She had yet done noth-ing with it to dis-charge the en-er-gy it con-tained. Un-der these cir-cum-stances, most would in-stinc-tive-ly use as much pow-er as they can ob-tain. Ei-ther this is the full ex-tent of the tech-nique's pow-er, or there are ad-di-tion-al re-stric-tions, meth-ods that she must learn to use the pow-er to its fullest. In ei-ther case, I do not be-lieve that it is un-safe to re-turn the ar-ti-fact to the girl.]

  Ever since the sword was pre-sent-ed to those here, there was much mut-ter-ing and mum-bling, Ki'el saw that even the el-ders and mas-ters were dis-cussing qui-et-ly with each oth-er, some trad-ing looks and in-tent silent-ly rather than speak-ing aloud.

  "And what about the oth-er? The spir-i-tu-al guide?" Broth-er Du's voice was still on edge.

  El-der Gol coughed aloud, and the vi-sion van-ished. "Ac-cord-ing to the Sect by-laws, I will not be pre-sent-ing the form of any spir-i-tu-al en-ti-ty to those un-aware of it, even un-der these cir-cum-stances. I would have the ac-cused speak on the mat-ter, but in my es-ti-ma-tion, its bond-ing was a mat-ter of con-sent."

  Ki'el un-der-stood that Kuli was on tri-al here, and sud-den-ly, the harsh re-stric-tion on her abil-i-ty to use her spir-it made more sense, but she nod-ded. "The spir-it... was not giv-en to me di-rect-ly by my mas-ter, but I was told I would re-ceive it, and it has since passed mes-sages to and from my mas-ter. I was asked my con-sent, and gave it freely. To date, Kuli--the spir-it has not done any-thing against my will, and has of-ten re-fused to act so that I must learn things for my-self."

  "But it was able to con-vey to you an in-cred-i-bly pow-er-ful in-tent," Broth-er Du's voice was still sharp, "in a mat-ter of mo-ments, when fail-ure meant death. This is no sim-ple en-ti-ty."

  Ki'el turned to look at him, and saw that Broth-er Du's face was as se-ri-ous as his voice. She hes-i-tat-ed. "It is... not sim-ple. It is..." she paused. "I am un-cer-tain what I am al-lowed to say."

  "Why?" The voice of an-oth-er El-der broke in. "You want to pro-tect the se-crets of your mas-ter even if it might cost you your life, or your chance to re-main at the Sect?"

  Ki'el turned to look at that El-der, some-one for-eign to her, and frowned at him. "Did you not all agree that I was at-tacked first?"

  "The ques-tion now, young Ki'el," the woman in charge said, "is whether or not you are taint-ed by an in-flu-ence too pow-er-ful for you to re-sist, too clever for you to de-tect malfeasence in, too deep in your mind for you to even per-ceive the work-ings of. Per-haps even a be-ing too pow-er-ful, too mas-ter-ful, for those col-lect-ed here to safe-ly re-move." She ges-tured. "By all means, con-vince us. At this mo-ment, it should have no in-flu-ence over you, and if it tried, we would no-tice. But be care-ful what ar-gu-ments you make, be-cause we have good rea-son to be sus-pi-cious, and if you are too naive... we may need to act in your best in-ter-ests, what-ev-er your own de-sires may be."

  Ki'el stared at the woman for a long time, then looked away. "I would still need per-mis-sion to speak on some mat-ters."

  "Why?" the oth-er El-der asked, again.

  "Be-cause there are larg-er mat-ters in this world," she said. "I am aware of se-crets I do not have a right to share."

  "I ask again, why?" The El-der's voice be-came sharp. "It goes be-yond not trust-ing us. We are not ask-ing for in-tri-cate de-tails of some-one else's tech-nique. We're ask-ing you whether the en-ti-ty that is con-cealed in-side of you is an en-e-my. If you are un-will-ing to speak on that mat-ter in par-tic-u-lar, it cer-tain-ly sounds like an en-e-my to me."

  Ki'el sighed. She looked around at the gath-ered mas-ters and el-ders, and bowed her head.

  "I would at least like this mat-ter to re-main with only a few," she said, and af-ter a beat, she heard a clap.

  "Very well," the el-der in charge said. "In-ner and Core sect dis-ci-ples are dis-missed."

  Ki'el took sev-er-al deep breaths, hop-ing that what she was do-ing was okay, as the Sect dis-ci-ples be-gan to fil-ter out of the area.