A Mind of One's Own
Boundaries of Mirkwood
Chapter 13
A Mind of One’s Own
At least some things were predictable. While the other girls slept, Arielle spent the remainder of the night sorting through an attack plan and stargazing with Pointy Ears. Tyelco. Which ever.
Instead of setting a glare on Arielle when she approached, he let her sit at his side without complaint. Quiet and still during the night, he stirred only as the sun rose. Sunrise over a leafy gray-green sea with Tyelco was a resounding quiescent moment. All the world roused as lazy tendrils of a purplish haze on the eastern horizon broke through the seal set by the night. With more speed than she’d expected, it poured out red, orange-gold, and then amethyst rays. As the colors mixed, they turned the night sky into an early morning pale blue. It felt intimate. Though rational thought told her it was a sunrise and could not belong to anyone, she sensed Tyelco was permitting her to share in something profoundly his. Despite this, their proximity didn’t feel awkward. Caught up in what must be done later and the vision before her, she hardly noticed there wasn’t a single glare exchanged once that morning.
When Arielle sensed the others behind her stirring, she squeezed Tyelco’s shoulder and set about preparing to move out.
It was a good thing the other girls were up and about early because Arielle was antsy about the ordeal. She did not feel tired. The others didn’t get much shut eye, and because they had been awoken at the crack of dawn, Yumiko looked dazed and bleary-eyed, Niobe frequently yawned, and Abigail crankily resented being up.
Momentarily content that there were signs they’d be moving out soon, she quietly munched one of the cranberry granola bar Yumiko was passing around. At least, she was fairly confident it was granola.
Arielle had thought this fight through and had removed a pair of long knives from the cache. Niobe needed a weapon, even with her “Force” powers. They currently lay at her side as she munched. All was quite visible from her wooden perch overhanging the platform. Yumiko was eating with Neko (who was licking sardines from her incisors), Tyelco was off eating a bowl of rice deftly with chopsticks (Arielle was quite envious to see that Yumiko only needed to demonstrate their use once, as she had dined at Chinese restaurants all her life and had yet to master the skill), and Niobe and Abigail sat within Arielle’s ear-shot, chatting.
“I’m not used to running on fumes like this,” Abigail explained to Niobe as she chomping her granola like a dog with peanut butter in her mouth.
“Think of it this way; you’ve just spent all night revising and this afternoon is the exam.” Under all that stoic cultivation, Arielle could sense Niobe’s smirk as she spoke.
“This isn’t like that at all,” Abigail retorted through a mouthful of crunchy oats and cranberries. “For one, I’ve never spent the night before an exam packing it all in. I plan my study time. And, say I did spend all night studying; I’d know the answer or at least enough to bluff my way through. No, this isn’t anything like an exam. We’re attacking God-knows-what. It’s one thing to just react when you must, but certainly is another to go barging in.”
Niobe drained her cup of black tea. “Yes. They are very different,” she agreed thoughtfully. “You know, I once read that bravery is not in the blind response to danger, but the conscientious entrance into it.”
Arielle could hear that smirk again, and indulged in the expression herself. As Abigail stopped chewing (her face went blank as though processing a great deal of information), then seemed pensive as she compulsively twirled a ring on her finger. Niobe stood and walked across the platform to return her teacup to the bag. It lay below Arielle’s perch.
“Do you always take your eavesdropping literally?” Niobe asked softly without glancing up.
Arielle reminded herself she really oughtn’t be surprised that the jedi knew exactly where she was. “Were you always like this? Philosophical and messing with everyone?”
Niobe examined the branch overhead and managed to climb up next to Arielle with little difficulty even in her purple concert gown. “It,” she said as she sat down, “is my place to ask questions. Answers are rarely the only reward in asking.”
“Do you hear yourself?” Arielle placed a sheathed long knife on her own lap.
Niobe sighed, rubbing her forehead. “I do sound a bit elevated, no? It’s not as though I set out to make anyone feel foolish; I sense possibilities everywhere. Always have, only now I am inclined to share them; infinite possibilities for what might happen because of opinion, thought, or action. Keeping in such knowledge is wasteful. The ends are never clear, but I guess no one ever really sees them, for nothing truly ends.” Niobe leaned in towards Arielle, and she wondered if Niobe wasn’t talking to herself.
“So, by your avoidance of the answer, I take it you weren’t always like this.”
“That hardly matters now.” Niobe stretched out her back and yawned. “Oh!” her back popped. “Back home, when I felt others were straying in thought, in deeds, from what was at hand questions always occurred to me, but I never felt comfortable asking and asking. Here, everything speaks to me.” She smiled her enigmatic grin and stroked the bark beneath her fingers. “This tree speaks; you speak without saying words. Even the wind whispers. It is no longer strange for me to prod others to find for themselves what the world tells me in light and waves and song.”
Arielle wasn’t sure if she understood any of that.
“I suppose, the real question,” Niobe turned to Arielle, and the jedi’s violet eyes ripped and tore and it was impossible to tell if that voice came from Niobe’s mouth or from within Arielle’s own head, “is if you were always like this.”
The heavy beat of her heart knocked a breath from Arielle’s mouth. Momentarily, she felt the chill in the early morning air, the dreary ache of exhaustion in her limbs, and was forced to swallow down a sudden wave of guilt ebbing up for Tyelco’s friends. The sensations were gone as surreptitiously as they came. She was as she’d been for hours before; comfortable. She wasn’t really sleepy or hungry or cold. Too comfortable.
“We’re all different.”
“It’s our reformation. I suspect our change was not merely physical. Abigail and Yumiko have yet to comprehend the psychological effects these powers seem to be impressing upon us. Then again, their powers are more physical, while ours appear to be directly connected to our psyche. Our minds. It is possible they were not affected at all save for their powers, but (and I would have you agree with me), I do not think they are prepared to cope with this news. At least, not yet.”
Arielle didn’t know if she was prepared to cope with it. Sure, she was stable now, but there were always catches to these things. There was the possibility the lack of sleep or food or simply the mental exertion necessary to maintain her “powers” might become too much for her to handle, slowly driving her out of her mind. Obviously, her mind wasn’t originally designed to propel her through trees and hit everything she aimed at. Yes, there had been the anxiety and adrenaline to keep her going, but if that was all there was to it, she should have crashed by now.
“But then, what does it really matter?” Niobe was spacing off again. “We are still whole, I find my company pleasant, and I cannot help but feel I am still me. So was the other woman I was. We are two in one . . .”
“Okay, right, I get it. We’re ourselves; at least until we all go crazy.”
Niobe went quiet. There should have been some form of vehement denial or outright dismissal from the jedi. Now Arielle was worried.
Below them, Yumiko, with Neko on her shoulder, skipped over to Tyelco. He was finishing his rice.
“There is something about this place; my heart misgives. Perhaps our minds have altered as to compensate for the changes in our bodies, and if that is the case, we have no need to fear. Yet I feel some warning against this transition. Was it complete? If I am a Jedi, do I possess the abilities of a knight or master? Can I stretch them? Do I have limits?” Niobe’s voice turned darker. “Do I have the same faults? What is the danger?”
Arielle wanted to snort at the notion of Niobe becoming some Dark Jedi, but the other was dead serious, and given the gravity of the question, scoffing wouldn’t have been appropriate.
“Well, I’m not Neo, but I’m probably not supposed to be either. Yumiko’s keen; she called me Trinity earlier.”
“Keen, yes.” She didn’t sound convinced.
Yumiko had taken Pointy Ear’s empty bowl, but was now forcing poor Neko on him. Arielle doubted he cared much for cats, if she were to judge his opinion of them from his sneer. He looked as though the notion of petting a cat were quite scandalous.
“We’ve got to figure out what’s going on and our best chance of that is talking to these guys, so,” Arielle passed Niobe the long knife. “Just in case.”
With a nod, Niobe accepted the long knife and dropped to the platform.
Poor Tyelco let out a shout of indignation as Neko batted at the shifting, sparkly sheen of light reflected off his shimmering, golden locks. Arielle snorted as the cat made quick work of his meticulously ordered hair. It only required seconds, but when Yumiko had managed to recapture her cat, his tresses were completely mussed. Tyelco glared at Neko with murder in his eyes, his fingers twitching for his arrows.
“Mew?” said Niko.
Instead of shooting the feigningly innocent Neko, Tyelco stormed away. He elegantly swung himself up and onto Arielle’s perch; his handsome face was set in a pout, his hair was tousled.
Arielle desperately tried not to crack up laughing. “You’re kinda sexy with bed hair, you know that?”
He detected her sarcasm, Arielle just knew it. Aristocrats must have some kind of internal sarcasm detector.
Startling and barely snatching the green, plastic hairbrush midair before it soundly met the back of his head, Tyelco frantically sought the source of the projectile.
“Hairbrush, dijobu!” Yumiko gave him a thumbs-up.
Poor, poor, confused Tyelco didn’t quite know what to make of any of it. He did only what he could resign to do; brush and re-braid his hair. Arielle watched in fascination as he unbound the knot. Quickly, and without static, he brushed it out until it was a perfect, straight sheen and dexterously braided it back. She was so envious she felt sick and green. Green with envy. Green like the Grinch. She felt like stealing something.
“I hate you. Ever read The Rape of the Lock? You are Belinda, vain maid, and I am a Sylph with scissors.”
Again, he scowled, detecting sarcasm, but complete incapable of doling it back.
From below, Niobe called, “Let us away.”
Touching his shoulder, Arielle inclined her head so that Tyelco would follow her. Then she dropped down beside Niobe.
“About time too. Everyone got their gear?” Arielle looked around assessing everyone’s state of preparation. Niobe had her knife strapped around her waist. That woman was going to be deadly. Abigail stood rubbing her hands together, her wand in the middle as though it would spark a fire. The motion producing a loud, repetitive clicking sound as the wood struck her ring over and over again. Yumiko was slipping a quiver over her bag. As Yumiko tightened the strap, Neko leapt and took up her post on her mistress’ shoulder.
Arielle didn’t want the cat anywhere near the fight. “No Neko. Dijobu? Cats no good in fights. Leave her here,” Arielle pointed to the deck. “Okay?”
Yumiko blinked, and shook her head in shocked dejection, clinging to Neko’s tail.
“Niobe, could you make her see reason?” Arielle asked.
Obliging, Niobe motioned for Yumiko to look into her eyes and staring ensued. The argument must have been intense, as it lasted far longer than it should. When Niobe finally blinked, she declared, “Yumiko fears to leave Neko on her own. She promises to keep the cat safe and will not be impeded by her presence.”
“Please tell me you’re kidding.”
“By no means. Shall we be off?”
Abigail began to slink toward the ladder. “Yes, let’s.”
There were never walls around when Arielle needed a solid surface to bang her head against. Did no one else realize they were about to fight, possibly, hundreds of spiders and unspeakably monstrous urk? Intentionally?
Arielle turned to Tyelco. He too looked vexed. His distaste for Neko was caught in the faint crevices at the corner of his mouth. “It looks like we’ve finally found something we agree on, non?”
In an oh-so-predictably Tyleco-en manner, the edhel faintly creased his eyebrows as if questioning whether or not this gambit would end with them unconscious and wrapped up in a silken shroud just before being ensanguined. Arielle set off after the other girls. “I’m only saying this aloud because you can’t understand me. I’m really glad you’re here, Ty.”
dijobu (Japanese, J) = “okay”
non (French, Fr.) = “no?”
Chapter 13
A Mind of One’s Own
At least some things were predictable. While the other girls slept, Arielle spent the remainder of the night sorting through an attack plan and stargazing with Pointy Ears. Tyelco. Which ever.
Instead of setting a glare on Arielle when she approached, he let her sit at his side without complaint. Quiet and still during the night, he stirred only as the sun rose. Sunrise over a leafy gray-green sea with Tyelco was a resounding quiescent moment. All the world roused as lazy tendrils of a purplish haze on the eastern horizon broke through the seal set by the night. With more speed than she’d expected, it poured out red, orange-gold, and then amethyst rays. As the colors mixed, they turned the night sky into an early morning pale blue. It felt intimate. Though rational thought told her it was a sunrise and could not belong to anyone, she sensed Tyelco was permitting her to share in something profoundly his. Despite this, their proximity didn’t feel awkward. Caught up in what must be done later and the vision before her, she hardly noticed there wasn’t a single glare exchanged once that morning.
When Arielle sensed the others behind her stirring, she squeezed Tyelco’s shoulder and set about preparing to move out.
It was a good thing the other girls were up and about early because Arielle was antsy about the ordeal. She did not feel tired. The others didn’t get much shut eye, and because they had been awoken at the crack of dawn, Yumiko looked dazed and bleary-eyed, Niobe frequently yawned, and Abigail crankily resented being up.
Momentarily content that there were signs they’d be moving out soon, she quietly munched one of the cranberry granola bar Yumiko was passing around. At least, she was fairly confident it was granola.
Arielle had thought this fight through and had removed a pair of long knives from the cache. Niobe needed a weapon, even with her “Force” powers. They currently lay at her side as she munched. All was quite visible from her wooden perch overhanging the platform. Yumiko was eating with Neko (who was licking sardines from her incisors), Tyelco was off eating a bowl of rice deftly with chopsticks (Arielle was quite envious to see that Yumiko only needed to demonstrate their use once, as she had dined at Chinese restaurants all her life and had yet to master the skill), and Niobe and Abigail sat within Arielle’s ear-shot, chatting.
“I’m not used to running on fumes like this,” Abigail explained to Niobe as she chomping her granola like a dog with peanut butter in her mouth.
“Think of it this way; you’ve just spent all night revising and this afternoon is the exam.” Under all that stoic cultivation, Arielle could sense Niobe’s smirk as she spoke.
“This isn’t like that at all,” Abigail retorted through a mouthful of crunchy oats and cranberries. “For one, I’ve never spent the night before an exam packing it all in. I plan my study time. And, say I did spend all night studying; I’d know the answer or at least enough to bluff my way through. No, this isn’t anything like an exam. We’re attacking God-knows-what. It’s one thing to just react when you must, but certainly is another to go barging in.”
Niobe drained her cup of black tea. “Yes. They are very different,” she agreed thoughtfully. “You know, I once read that bravery is not in the blind response to danger, but the conscientious entrance into it.”
Arielle could hear that smirk again, and indulged in the expression herself. As Abigail stopped chewing (her face went blank as though processing a great deal of information), then seemed pensive as she compulsively twirled a ring on her finger. Niobe stood and walked across the platform to return her teacup to the bag. It lay below Arielle’s perch.
“Do you always take your eavesdropping literally?” Niobe asked softly without glancing up.
Arielle reminded herself she really oughtn’t be surprised that the jedi knew exactly where she was. “Were you always like this? Philosophical and messing with everyone?”
Niobe examined the branch overhead and managed to climb up next to Arielle with little difficulty even in her purple concert gown. “It,” she said as she sat down, “is my place to ask questions. Answers are rarely the only reward in asking.”
“Do you hear yourself?” Arielle placed a sheathed long knife on her own lap.
Niobe sighed, rubbing her forehead. “I do sound a bit elevated, no? It’s not as though I set out to make anyone feel foolish; I sense possibilities everywhere. Always have, only now I am inclined to share them; infinite possibilities for what might happen because of opinion, thought, or action. Keeping in such knowledge is wasteful. The ends are never clear, but I guess no one ever really sees them, for nothing truly ends.” Niobe leaned in towards Arielle, and she wondered if Niobe wasn’t talking to herself.
“So, by your avoidance of the answer, I take it you weren’t always like this.”
“That hardly matters now.” Niobe stretched out her back and yawned. “Oh!” her back popped. “Back home, when I felt others were straying in thought, in deeds, from what was at hand questions always occurred to me, but I never felt comfortable asking and asking. Here, everything speaks to me.” She smiled her enigmatic grin and stroked the bark beneath her fingers. “This tree speaks; you speak without saying words. Even the wind whispers. It is no longer strange for me to prod others to find for themselves what the world tells me in light and waves and song.”
Arielle wasn’t sure if she understood any of that.
“I suppose, the real question,” Niobe turned to Arielle, and the jedi’s violet eyes ripped and tore and it was impossible to tell if that voice came from Niobe’s mouth or from within Arielle’s own head, “is if you were always like this.”
The heavy beat of her heart knocked a breath from Arielle’s mouth. Momentarily, she felt the chill in the early morning air, the dreary ache of exhaustion in her limbs, and was forced to swallow down a sudden wave of guilt ebbing up for Tyelco’s friends. The sensations were gone as surreptitiously as they came. She was as she’d been for hours before; comfortable. She wasn’t really sleepy or hungry or cold. Too comfortable.
“We’re all different.”
“It’s our reformation. I suspect our change was not merely physical. Abigail and Yumiko have yet to comprehend the psychological effects these powers seem to be impressing upon us. Then again, their powers are more physical, while ours appear to be directly connected to our psyche. Our minds. It is possible they were not affected at all save for their powers, but (and I would have you agree with me), I do not think they are prepared to cope with this news. At least, not yet.”
Arielle didn’t know if she was prepared to cope with it. Sure, she was stable now, but there were always catches to these things. There was the possibility the lack of sleep or food or simply the mental exertion necessary to maintain her “powers” might become too much for her to handle, slowly driving her out of her mind. Obviously, her mind wasn’t originally designed to propel her through trees and hit everything she aimed at. Yes, there had been the anxiety and adrenaline to keep her going, but if that was all there was to it, she should have crashed by now.
“But then, what does it really matter?” Niobe was spacing off again. “We are still whole, I find my company pleasant, and I cannot help but feel I am still me. So was the other woman I was. We are two in one . . .”
“Okay, right, I get it. We’re ourselves; at least until we all go crazy.”
Niobe went quiet. There should have been some form of vehement denial or outright dismissal from the jedi. Now Arielle was worried.
Below them, Yumiko, with Neko on her shoulder, skipped over to Tyelco. He was finishing his rice.
“There is something about this place; my heart misgives. Perhaps our minds have altered as to compensate for the changes in our bodies, and if that is the case, we have no need to fear. Yet I feel some warning against this transition. Was it complete? If I am a Jedi, do I possess the abilities of a knight or master? Can I stretch them? Do I have limits?” Niobe’s voice turned darker. “Do I have the same faults? What is the danger?”
Arielle wanted to snort at the notion of Niobe becoming some Dark Jedi, but the other was dead serious, and given the gravity of the question, scoffing wouldn’t have been appropriate.
“Well, I’m not Neo, but I’m probably not supposed to be either. Yumiko’s keen; she called me Trinity earlier.”
“Keen, yes.” She didn’t sound convinced.
Yumiko had taken Pointy Ear’s empty bowl, but was now forcing poor Neko on him. Arielle doubted he cared much for cats, if she were to judge his opinion of them from his sneer. He looked as though the notion of petting a cat were quite scandalous.
“We’ve got to figure out what’s going on and our best chance of that is talking to these guys, so,” Arielle passed Niobe the long knife. “Just in case.”
With a nod, Niobe accepted the long knife and dropped to the platform.
Poor Tyelco let out a shout of indignation as Neko batted at the shifting, sparkly sheen of light reflected off his shimmering, golden locks. Arielle snorted as the cat made quick work of his meticulously ordered hair. It only required seconds, but when Yumiko had managed to recapture her cat, his tresses were completely mussed. Tyelco glared at Neko with murder in his eyes, his fingers twitching for his arrows.
“Mew?” said Niko.
Instead of shooting the feigningly innocent Neko, Tyelco stormed away. He elegantly swung himself up and onto Arielle’s perch; his handsome face was set in a pout, his hair was tousled.
Arielle desperately tried not to crack up laughing. “You’re kinda sexy with bed hair, you know that?”
He detected her sarcasm, Arielle just knew it. Aristocrats must have some kind of internal sarcasm detector.
Startling and barely snatching the green, plastic hairbrush midair before it soundly met the back of his head, Tyelco frantically sought the source of the projectile.
“Hairbrush, dijobu!” Yumiko gave him a thumbs-up.
Poor, poor, confused Tyelco didn’t quite know what to make of any of it. He did only what he could resign to do; brush and re-braid his hair. Arielle watched in fascination as he unbound the knot. Quickly, and without static, he brushed it out until it was a perfect, straight sheen and dexterously braided it back. She was so envious she felt sick and green. Green with envy. Green like the Grinch. She felt like stealing something.
“I hate you. Ever read The Rape of the Lock? You are Belinda, vain maid, and I am a Sylph with scissors.”
Again, he scowled, detecting sarcasm, but complete incapable of doling it back.
From below, Niobe called, “Let us away.”
Touching his shoulder, Arielle inclined her head so that Tyelco would follow her. Then she dropped down beside Niobe.
“About time too. Everyone got their gear?” Arielle looked around assessing everyone’s state of preparation. Niobe had her knife strapped around her waist. That woman was going to be deadly. Abigail stood rubbing her hands together, her wand in the middle as though it would spark a fire. The motion producing a loud, repetitive clicking sound as the wood struck her ring over and over again. Yumiko was slipping a quiver over her bag. As Yumiko tightened the strap, Neko leapt and took up her post on her mistress’ shoulder.
Arielle didn’t want the cat anywhere near the fight. “No Neko. Dijobu? Cats no good in fights. Leave her here,” Arielle pointed to the deck. “Okay?”
Yumiko blinked, and shook her head in shocked dejection, clinging to Neko’s tail.
“Niobe, could you make her see reason?” Arielle asked.
Obliging, Niobe motioned for Yumiko to look into her eyes and staring ensued. The argument must have been intense, as it lasted far longer than it should. When Niobe finally blinked, she declared, “Yumiko fears to leave Neko on her own. She promises to keep the cat safe and will not be impeded by her presence.”
“Please tell me you’re kidding.”
“By no means. Shall we be off?”
Abigail began to slink toward the ladder. “Yes, let’s.”
There were never walls around when Arielle needed a solid surface to bang her head against. Did no one else realize they were about to fight, possibly, hundreds of spiders and unspeakably monstrous urk? Intentionally?
Arielle turned to Tyelco. He too looked vexed. His distaste for Neko was caught in the faint crevices at the corner of his mouth. “It looks like we’ve finally found something we agree on, non?”
In an oh-so-predictably Tyleco-en manner, the edhel faintly creased his eyebrows as if questioning whether or not this gambit would end with them unconscious and wrapped up in a silken shroud just before being ensanguined. Arielle set off after the other girls. “I’m only saying this aloud because you can’t understand me. I’m really glad you’re here, Ty.”
dijobu (Japanese, J) = “okay”
non (French, Fr.) = “no?”
Subtitles
- Darkness and Starlight
- Abigail of Wellington
- Niobe of St. Andrews
- Arielle of Cedar Brook
- Yumiko of Shinjuku
- The Banks of River Running
- Stiff and Stark
- Screams in the Dark
- The Red Bird
- Many Meetings
- Night Fight
- Yumiko's New Friend
- A Mind of One's Own
- Running in Circles
- The Price for Revenge
- The Coming Night
- It Speaks English!
- Fragile Things: I
- Lull