"Keep your guard up," Catherine yelled to Azela.
"I am!" Azela yelled back.
"That bruise on your cheek says otherwise." Catherine grinned, rolling her shoulder back into a defensive position. The cold water around her shins made her joints ache in a way she was choosing to ignore. "Not as quick on your feet when almost knee-deep in running water, are you?"
"I could have dodged if I wasn't distracted!"
Catherine laughed. "And you expect every fight to be free of distractions, do you? You can be quicker than a panicking cat and it won't mean anything if you can't focus."
Azela's jaw tightened. She hated being told what she couldn't do. Catherine had noticed this early on, and had decided it made her an excellent student.
They stood facing each other in the stream, both in fighting stances. They wore simple wraps and short skirts they had made themselves from the fibrous plants along the bank. These were not their finest work. The seams were uneven, and Catherine's hem sat an inch higher on one side than the other, a fact that bothered her only when she had nothing else to think about. But the material breathed, dried quickly, and didn't snag on branches, which were the things that actually mattered.
Today's self-defense lesson had been changed due to a disagreement. Azela claimed that she could simply avoid strikes and therefore didn't need to learn how to defend herself against them, and Catherine was proving her wrong.
Yellow rays from the sun shined through the trees' branches, reflecting off the water and back to the leaves in a rainbow of colors. A day like this was perfect for training in the shade, where the waves of color danced with the shadows of the teacher and her student. The stream was cold and quick around their legs, and the sound of it filled the spaces between instructions.
Catherine turned serious. "You're a lot faster than me. Probably faster than any sapien alive. But you rely too much on that to evade my attacks. You won't always have a sapien opponent. Or enough room to maneuver. You have to learn how to block, parry, and counter. Don't be afraid to take a hit once in a while. You can learn to use that to your advantage."
So far, Catherine had been amazed at how quickly Azela could master every technique she had to teach. What took Catherine years to perfect, Azela performed effortlessly. She didn't know that to Azela, it was more like recalling something long forgotten than learning. The muscle memory of her body had not forgotten as much as her mind, it seemed.
This was how they spent most of their time, with Catherine teaching Azela anything and everything about this world of which she knew so little. Though often they would spend hours playing childish games or just lie around for an entire day instead. Whether it was day or night never really mattered. The leaves of the trees gave off more than enough light to see when the sky was dark, and also enough shade to shield them from the bright sunlight.
Whenever they were tired, no matter what the time, Catherine would trudge back to her rock and Azela retired to her spot by the stream. Usually, it was Azela who woke first and retrieved Catherine from her slumber for another few hours of spirited recreation. It had become its own kind of rhythm. Unhurried, unplanned, and surprisingly easy, like they had been doing this for much longer than they had.
Catherine acted as if she were about to chamber a kick, and Azela was quick to slide to the side. Too quick. As Azela moved right to avoid a kick that never came, Catherine caught her with a soft "punch" from the same direction, which was more like a tap, harmless to everything but Azela's ego. "Nice try," the teacher added between laughs.
"I'm tired of this," said Azela as she moved out of the stream to sit. "How about you teach me some magic instead?"
Catherine went with her but remained standing. "Believe me, I would teach you a little of my spellcraft, if I had any idea how. We should have asked your friend for books aimed at beginners, when we still had the time. I never had a teacher myself."
"They didn't even teach you the basics?" she asked, hopefully.
"The only form of magic that was openly taught was literacy. And even then, only the local sapien version was tolerated."
"And I already know how to read," said Azela.
Catherine shrugged. "Sorry. I lack the tools to help you understand complexities that, if I'm honest, I use mostly by instinct."
"How did you learn, then, if you never had a teacher?"
Catherine didn't answer immediately, looking around herself uncomfortably before saying, "When I was young, I discovered that certain feelings I had were considered unnatural. Wrong. It made me start wondering about all the other forbidden things I wasn't allowed to enjoy. What was so dangerous about them?" She paused. "Every acolyte was assigned duties. Chores, mostly. Cleaning. Some of them involved the library."
She saw Azela go still, listening as she did when her interest was caught.
"I took on the chores of others assigned to the library, as favors they were supposed to repay. Of course, they never did. They conveniently forgot, or decided some previous kindness made us even. They never understood that I already had what I wanted." A small smile. "I memorized everything. The schedules, the routines, who worked late, who left early, which floorboards creaked near the restricted shelves. I soon knew every corner of that building, every shadow and shortcut. I can still draw a map of each section down to the last cobweb, if I felt the need." She looked at her hands. The smile faded slightly. "I couldn't keep a stolen book for long. They'd notice it was missing. But I have a talent for…"
Catherine quieted as she saw Azela's ears twitch. "What do you hear?"
Azela looked surprised. "How do you know I heard something?"
"We've been together every day for a full lunar cycle. I can read you like a sigil," she replied with a smirk.
A smile spread across Azela's face. "Five's coming. I hear the motor on his bike."
Catherine didn't seem as happy. "I suppose this means we have to return the last of the books." She sighed. "I had already made room in my pack to take them with us."
"This will be better than leaving him a note." Azela was already standing, looking up. "He really does worry about me. You wanna surprise him?"
Before Catherine could respond, Azela had leapt into the nearest tree and nimbly swung herself through the branches. "Come on!" she called down, "What's keeping you?"
"We sapiens don't have wings, you know!" Catherine yelled.
"Neither do I!" she called back.
As Catherine reached the second branch, Azela was already at the top. "This'll be high enough for me," Catherine groaned, amazed as always at Azela's acrobatic skills. She looked up at her, a distant shape perched against the canopy, and felt something between admiration and envy.
Five arrived in a cloud of noise and disturbed undergrowth, parking beside the garden. He did not see Azela until she was already on his back seat, having dropped from the canopy in a single arc that was, Catherine admitted, objectively impressive.
Smiling at her own jealousy, Catherine jumped down to the ground from her perch. Five didn't even notice her.
In an attempt to rebuild some self-confidence, she walked as sexily as she could to the front of his bike and faced him as she leaned in slowly, positioning the tire between her legs.
"Hey there," Catherine said seductively. That got his attention.
Azela hugged him from behind, saying, "We have some bad news."
"What's that?" he asked, clearly distracted by Catherine. She smiled.
"You can't come see us anymore," Azela replied.
Five wiped the sweat from his brow. "Why not?"
"We're leaving," Catherine answered. "'Tis time we got out of here. Zel and I are fed up with living like animals. We may be fugitives, but we're taking the risk anyway." She looked at Five daringly. "You can't stop us."
"That's too bad," Five said. He seemed genuinely sorry. "I'll let MegaGlitch know. Which way are you ladies heading?"
"To Starhold," Azela said before Catherine could stop her.
Five nodded, working it through. "Starhold. Dangerous. But it makes sense. Abandoned by all accounts, and folk are as afraid to go there as they are to come here. With so many empty buildings, you could have a proper home. Shelter, at least."
"You see? It's a good plan." Azela gave him a squeeze. "And Catherine is like, crazy powerful. She can handle anything that tries to eat us."
"How do you plan on getting past the myst, though?" he asked. "You don't plan on just walking through it, do you?"
"Oh, please," Catherine said. "Nobody would be that dumb. I can summon us a ride."
"I don't know," he said, "That still sounds incredibly dangerous."
"It'll be fine. I have experience and Zel's a fast learner," Catherine said, then slid herself closer to his ear to say, "Pity I'll never get to really know you," in her most seductive voice. She left him stuttering a reply while she wandered down to the stream. Catherine was not typically one who could bear the kind of pointless chatter that Five and Azela always shared.
She sat next to her boots on the rocky shore and placed her feet in the current, staring at nothing in particular.
It was strange, the feeling. Like a tenderness in a place she hadn't known was bruised. She had spent weeks sleeping on a rock in the middle of a forest with no walls, no door, no certainty about what tomorrow contained, and she was going to miss it. The specific quality of the light here. The sound the stream made at night. The way Azela would appear at the edge of her vision in the morning, waiting with the patience of a squirrel that had somehow eaten an entire bag of sugar.
Her heart panged as she saw Azela gather their remaining books for Five to return to the library. When the two apostles had finished their hour-long conversation, he rode off, and Azela came down to join her.
"You didn't say goodbye," said Azela. "Aren't you going to miss him?"
"You'll miss him enough for the both of us." Catherine looked downstream. "You shouldn't have told him where we're going."
"I didn't tell him what our real plans are. He just would've said, 'Oh, I reckon you shouldn't go looking into your past, lil' darlin'. Just be stupid and ignorant, that's what barkeep says.'" Azela said, lying next to her.
Catherine laughed at her imitation. "I doubt he would phrase it exactly like that. But you're right. He is still clueless." She turned a stone over with her toe. "He was good to us. To you in particular. I've just never parted ways with a goodbye, and it feels too late to start now."
"Y'know, it wasn't a lie. We are going to Starhold. Where better to build a ship than an abandoned port?" Azela giggled. "I'm tired of not knowing who I was. Even if I was a bloodthirsty, evil demon, I have a right to know. It's not as if I'm still like that. I just want to know who I really am."
Catherine sat up and examined the somber expression hidden beneath Azela's facade. It was a look she recognized. A stark awareness of being incomplete. "Don't worry, it may take years, but with a few shipwrecks to study, we'll be on our way to Pandoria before we know it. If anyone can tell you about your past, 'tis the Pandorians. As long as we stick together, no one can stop us! We can rule the world if we want to!" She laughed like the villain in a children's story, loud enough to disturb whatever was living in the nearby trees.
Azela smiled. Catherine didn't notice the gradual change that took place since Azela found her, but Azela did, and she liked it. Catherine had become friendlier, happier, and even looked healthier. She was the only person Azela really trusted, as Shi-Yon briefly was. But unlike Shi-Yon, Catherine truly made her feel like she wasn't alone. They were good for each other, despite how they ended up here.
Without warning, Azela sat up and hugged her, making the startled sapien blush.
"Cathy..." Azela said in response to the warm feeling inside of her, "Thank you."
"Please," Catherine replied with the awkwardness of someone unused to physical contact, "If you're going to give me a nickname, make it something else."