Chapter 389: Learning the Difference

Chapter 389: Learning the Difference

On Monday morning, Flicker’s first Ember Shot rocked the weighted target post back an inch. It settled with a thump, a fresh scorch spreading across the older marks.

Flicker stared at it from the near perch. Jin looked from her to the post.

"Again," he said, after a moment. "Same distance."

The second one rocked the post again. The third did too.

The fourth went wide, because she’d started to fire before she’d finished turning her head, which was exactly what she’d done at Rank 1, 5-Star when she got excited. Some things a Sync didn’t fix.

Her endurance had improved too. She finished the usual six lengths without the laboured breathing that had previously ended practice. Jin added a little distance and stopped while she was still flying well. They could build on that.

On Tuesday afternoon, he brought Glitch into the yard to practise the approach they used against a larger opponent. A padded target stood beside the drake, far enough from his flank that a missed shot would pass behind him. Glitch’s job was to turn and intercept after Flicker fired, stopping at the painted line between them.

The first run nearly went wrong. Flicker hit the target hard, and Glitch turned toward the impact while she was still admiring it. His head reached the line before she had climbed clear. He stopped, but the tip of his horn passed beneath her tail.

Flicker shot upward with an indignant cry. Jin raised his hand before she could come round again.

"Wait. Both of you."

He checked the space between the target and the line. It had been enough when they were moving slowly. With Flicker arriving faster and Glitch turning sharply, it left very little room for a mistake. He moved the target farther back and asked Glitch for a slow turn without the bird.

Flicker watched from the fence, feathers still lifted.

"You can’t stay to look," Jin told her. "Even if it’s a good shot."

He’d been doing it too. He liked seeing the post rock. On that last pass, he’d watched it move before giving her the return signal.

For the next run, he marked her way out before sending her in: approach from the left, fire at the target, climb toward the empty far corner. She knew the destination before she left his arm.

She fired and turned as Glitch moved. His nose reached the line with her already well above it.

"There," Jin said. "Again, slowly."

They worked in short sets with rests between them. Twice Flicker began the climb before firing, and once Jin pointed too late and confused her. He stopped treating the escape as a second instruction to tack on after the attack. When he gave her a clear route first, she left more cleanly.

That didn’t mean every beast would chase her. Some would ignore a shot; others would strike at the approach. Glitch varied his turn on Jin’s signal, making her keep watching instead of repeating the same flight blindly.

By the last set she could fire, turn and clear the line without his hurried wave. She landed on Glitch’s back afterward as though he had invited her. He bent his neck to inspect her, and she began arranging a feather under her wing.

Lucian came by on Wednesday with Kite on his arm. He watched from the wall until Jin called a rest.

"She’s getting away cleaner," he said.

"When I tell her where she’s going before she gets there."

Lucian grinned. "Useful habit."

They moved two targets to opposite sides of the yard and worked on approaches with both birds. Kite’s high stoop carried much more force; Flicker needed room to cross beneath her without entering the falcon’s path. The first attempt ended with Jin calling Flicker back before she fired. On the second, Lucian delayed Kite’s descent and the attacks reached their separate targets a moment apart.

"Better," Lucian said. "But you watched Kite all the way down."

Jin looked at the empty stretch where Flicker had waited for his next signal.

"I know."

"Your bird, Astor. Mine’s already got someone staring at her."

Jin laughed and offered Flicker his arm. They changed positions for the next set, putting both targets within his view.

The big stone ran out on Tuesday night, the one he’d started under Brand.

He felt it go the way Brand had taught him, the threads thinning and the grit fading, and then nothing to take. He put it at the back of the drawer beside the empty Thornwatch one.

On Wednesday night, he unwrapped a new one from the nine in the cloth and took his first thread from it, thin and slow.

Eight big stones still sat untouched in the cloth, with the two small Thornwatch ones on the other side of the box. One stone was partly used.

He entered the change in Saturday’s log. His sessions were becoming steadier, with fewer interruptions to clear coarse threads. Some nights he stopped earlier than others. He was learning to trust that decision instead of judging the session by how long he’d lasted.

On Thursday evening, he went home to Coldwell for dinner.

Elena was on a late shift and Elsa was at a friend’s house. When Jin got there, the flat was quiet, and Arthur was sitting at the kitchen table with a box open in front of him.

The dented metal box usually lived under his parents’ bed. Arthur had spread its contents on a rag: old steel harness buckles, heavy enough for a large beast. He was working oil into one of the hinges.

Arthur didn’t explain, so Jin didn’t ask. He picked up a second rag, took a buckle out of the box and started cleaning it.

They worked for a while without saying anything.

"Your mother said you went to the hatchery with your sister," Arthur said eventually.

"Last Wednesday. She’d measured the whole flat with a thermometer."

"She did it every morning before school for a week. Woke me up twice." Arthur turned a buckle over in his fingers. "She’s taking it seriously."

"She’s taking it more seriously than I would have."

Arthur made a small noise that might have been a laugh. He set the buckle down on the cloth with the clean ones and picked up another.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"What do you want?" Arthur didn’t look up. "Out of it. Being a tamer." He worked the oil into a hinge. "When you started, you wanted the family safe. You wanted money. You wanted your sister to have a chance. That was all right."

He set the buckle down. "You’ve got some of that now. So what do you want?"

Jin opened his mouth and found that he didn’t have an answer ready.

He thought of the view from the Ember Shelf at Thornwatch, and all the country beyond the routes he knew. He’d wanted to stay looking long after it was time to leave.

"I want to be able to choose," he said slowly. "Where I go. What I take on. Not just whatever’s posted." He turned the buckle over. "I want to go and look at things. Places. Without someone else deciding whether I’m allowed."

He stopped, and felt faintly embarrassed, and polished the buckle harder than it needed.

"And I want you lot to be fine while I’m doing it," he added.

Arthur was quiet for a while.

"I wanted that," he said. "At your age. Exactly that." He picked up the next buckle. "I got some of it. Not as much as I wanted."

Arthur tested the buckle’s hinge with his thumb. "You’ve got good people teaching you. Keep asking them things, even when you think you’ve caught up."

"Lucian would enjoy hearing that."

"Then don’t tell him I said it." His father glanced at him. "And send us something when you go. Your sister gets an antler. Your mother would like a picture occasionally."

Jin smiled. "I can do pictures."

Jin put his cleaned buckle on the cloth beside Arthur’s. They went on with the box until it was empty, and then Arthur closed it and put it back under the bed. Neither of them said anything else about it.

On the walk back to the academy, Jin thought about the Engine dungeon. In the Pillar Court, at the north end, a ramp ran up into the dark past the broken pillars. He’d seen it every time he fought the ram. He’d never followed it.

He wondered whether the ramp joined another worked passage or ended at a collapse. Once Glitch’s avatar had recovered properly, he could find out.