Al-though Ki'el spent a lit-tle time try-ing to find ei-ther Mian or Xam, in the end, she could find nei-ther, and so she elect-ed to go to the edge of the is-land of the Less-er House and look out at the world be-yond. Al-though she kept in mind the warn-ing from Sis-ter Futi that she not go where some-one could trap her alone, it felt to her like now would be a very bad time for any-one to at-tempt to kill her if they were try-ing to re-main hid-den. Even so, she did not get close to the edge, in-stead find-ing a time- and care-worn boul-der that was set far back from the edge, and sat there, look-ing out.

  A part of her had ex-pect-ed the aether here to be much fresh-er than the aether by the Less-er House, and when it did not, she qui-et-ly asked Kuli if she had an idea why.

  { There is a field sur-round-ing the whole of the Moon-stole Is-land Sect, } Kuli re-spond-ed, { such that the fresh qi and aether of the sect is drawn in through the high-est is-lands, and the spent qi is re-leased at the bot-tom. While it would not be im-pos-si-ble to gath-er fresh-er aether here, most of it is drawn away by pow-er-ful scripts sunk deeply into the is-lands. }

  Ki'el felt that was un-fair, but also, she could imag-ine it be-ing the log-ic of a place like this. The heal-ing house had it-self not been the high-est is-land, but the qi there was much fresh-er than it was here, and she had no-ticed its fad-ing as she moved down the path. Sure-ly, with all the dis-ci-ples and mas-ters here, what-ev-er made fresh aether so de-sir-able would be con-sumed first by the most pow-er-ful, and what re-mains di-vid-ed among the rest, with the Less-er House get-ting the least. She could even imag-ine, af-ter hav-ing sensed pow-er-ful qi sev-er-al times--from the Djang Prince and Princess, from Sobon, from Lai Shi Po, and now from El-der Gol--that it was some mer-cy not to ex-pose peo-ple to aether too pow-er-ful.

  { That is not wrong, but it is not right, } Kuli re-spond-ed. { There are sources of qi here, but the fresh aether from the world is no dif-fer-ent from a cool-ing breeze. It is not in-tense enough to do harm, though some may be dis-tract-ed if they must strug-gle against out-side in-flu-ences in or-der to study and mas-ter their own qi. }

  Ki'el looked out over the world, and she could con-vince her-self that the world be-yond the is-lands looked wrong--that the aether that she thought she saw did not quite match the aether of the world as it must ac-tu-al-ly be. Kuli said noth-ing of that, and Ki'el did not ask her to com-ment, in-stead clos-ing her eyes and fo-cus-ing in-wards in-stead. She knew, or she trust-ed Sobon when he had said, that she should not have used quite so much aether as she did re-cent-ly, but what that meant for her, she was un-sure.

  It took a few min-utes for Ki'el to qui-et, but when she did, Kuli was there, a com-fort-ing sis-ter with no pres-ence of her own. { You are not like Sobon, } she said, { and his meth-ods will not work quite right for you. Sobon did not make much use of his--of Alas-si's qi core. In truth, he does not know much of qi cores, but his friends, who cre-at-ed the Voice of the World, do. I con-tain some of their knowl-edge, when you are ready to ask. }

  Ki'el ac-cept-ed that, though she was a lit-tle ir-ri-tat-ed that Kuli used Ki'el's own name for the Voice, when she knew what it tru-ly was. Kuli's own thoughts, though, kept her fo-cused, and af-ter a mo-ment, Ki'el asked a sim-ple ques-tion. What am I sup-posed to be do-ing next?

  { Your dant-ian--your qi core--stretch-es as you fill it with qi, or aether, } Kuli said, { and your merid-i-ans--spir-it veins--must be ex-er-cised, so that they can eas-i-ly and safe-ly han-dle any amount of qi that you wish to use. You will also not wish your qi to sim-ply sit with-in your dant-ian, or it will grow stale. } Kuli paused. { The qi that you gath-er from the world is also im-pure, and most will strug-gle with un-der-stand how that can pos-si-bly be true, es-pe-cial-ly when it feels good or right. You trust Sobon when he says that it is true, but you also do not un-der-stand it yet. }

  Ki'el ac-cept-ed those thoughts, and ac-knowl-edged that she did not, in truth, un-der-stand why qi was im-pure. But the way that Kuli had phrased it made some things clear; qi that was only gath-ered would be very much un-like the aether from her pow-er cy-cles. She knew, be-cause Sobon had said so, that it was im-por-tant for the Cy-cles to pro-duce aether with-out in-tent, and she could un-der-stand why--be-cause it would copy what-ev-er came in, and if the in-tent that came out did not match what she need-ed, it would be trou-ble.

  Sobon... had said oth-er things, about great and pow-er-ful qi caus-ing mu-ta-tions and death, but she pushed those thoughts away for now.

  If the qi that came in was also qi with in-tent, for-eign in-tent be-long-ing to oth-ers, then of course Ki'el would wish to pu-ri-fy it be-fore us-ing it, but what hap-pened if she did not? She asked Kuli, but for once, the aug-ment with-in her mind was qui-et, let-ting her think for her-self. And when Ki'el could not think of an an-swer, she raised her hands be-fore her and at-tempt-ed to play with the qi in the air around her.

  It's not as though Ki'el knew much or any-thing about what one should do with qi, and so she spent her time try-ing to do the only thing Sobon had tru-ly taught her--to cre-ate a Pow-er Cy-cle, but of qi in-stead of aether. It was still a tricky thing to do, even when she could use her own, care-ful-ly con-trolled aether, and trick-i-er still with qi, which seemed a great deal heav-ier. It was clear to her very quick-ly that the same prin-ci-ple would not hold--that she could not cre-ate a wheel that would sim-ply cre-ate pu-ri-fied qi. Aether and qi were sim-ply too dif-fer-ent.

  And yet, that was not re-al-ly the ex-er-cise she want-ed, not the an-swer that she need-ed. She want-ed to know what hap-pened if you used qi when it was im-pure. And so she took the qi that she knew to be im-pure, and at-tempt-ed to cy-cle it, in-tend-ing only that the qi that cy-cled would be free from all else.

  It was not dif-fi-cult to de-tect the "dirt" that fell out of the qi as she did this.

  It was amaz-ing to Ki'el, amaz-ing enough that she had a lot of dif-fi-cul-ty con-tin-u-ing her cleans-ing ex-er-cise, and even-tu-al-ly she forced her-self to stop pe-ri-od-i-cal-ly and try to ex-am-ine the dirty qi's flakes of in-tent and na-ture that came from it as she turned it. It was im-pos-si-ble to her to see any-thing in the flakes--she un-der-stood noth-ing of greater uses of qi, and could not have been able to say if qi was med-ical, poi-son, or like the sun, not from the col-ored flecks that shed away from the qi as it bent. And she knew, as she cy-cled qi, that what fi-nal-ly gath-ered at the cen-ter, at the cy-cle's thorn, was not pure qi.

  Ki'el had seen pure qi, true pu-ri-fied qi, what oth-ers had called Pri-mor-dial Qi. Lai Shi Po even had an ar-ti-fact, one that Po had promised Ki'el could use some day, that would let her cre-ate this true pri-mor-dial qi for her-self; hav-ing seen the real thing, it was clear that this was not it, and even if the mas-ters of the Moon-stone Is-land sect told her that her qi was pure, she would know bet-ter.

  If pri-mor-dial qi was true white, then this was... white-ish. It was once-white cloth that had been dirt-ied and washed. Even if Ki'el could re-move the worst of the stains, it was not white. And Ki'el sat there, con-sid-er-ing the flecks that had fall-en out of her qi when she turned it, and un-der-stood that if she used qi that was not pure, then those flecks would be in-side of her in-stead of scat-tered across her open palms.

  { Cor-rect, } Kuli fi-nal-ly said. { The world's qi sys-tem pro-vides sev-er-al times, like you ex-pe-ri-enced at Sil-ver Qi, when it strug-gles against the im-pu-ri-ties that you have re-leased. But if you have less im-pu-ri-ties, it will do a bet-ter job. }

  Ki'el shiv-ered, and not from the chill of the wind and the thin air of the sect. The ex-pul-sion of... some un-de-fin-able shit from her body when she reached Sil-ver Qi had been sud-den and dis-gust-ing. She had been fight-ing pi-rates with Sobon, in his squir-rel form, and... and she had briefly been knocked un-con-scious by the fight-ing, to-wards the end. Though she had not spo-ken of it with Sobon, she had felt some-thing, when it hap-pened, al-though she had not awok-en.

  It felt very un-com-fort-ably like throw-ing up, only with every pore of her body.

  Even now she could re-call the sen-sa-tion, if fad-ed like a dream. It was an aghast feel-ing, like dis-cov-er-ing a dead and rot-bloat-ed mouse in the pitch-er of wa-ter you'd drunk from. A part of her had awok-en to the idea that some-thing aw-ful had hap-pened, and every ounce of her body re-ject-ed that aw-ful truth, ex-pelling every-thing--good or bad, to-geth-er--so that it could deny it all, pro-tect her from the aw-ful con-se-quences.

  The idea that some-day in the fu-ture, she would think that way about her pre-sent self and what she was do-ing, was un-com-fort-able.

  Once Ki'el's thoughts had set-tled, Kuli con-tin-ued. { The im-pu-ri-ties in your qi in-clude things you can-not yet un-der-stand, from the dif-fer-ent lay-ers of aether you may nev-er ful-ly learn. As you come to un-der-stand how the oth-er lay-ers of aether work, you can de-tect and re-move those im-pu-ri-ties. The stones are a use-ful ex-am-ple, here. Now that you un-der-stand that qi is not mere-ly emit-ted around you, but also af-fects the world around you at a dis-tance, you can find im-pu-ri-ties that make use of that part of qi. }

  Ki'el stud-ied the qi that she had been pu-ri-fy-ing, and she thought of those riv-er stones, and she un-der-stood. Even the less-dirty white qi that she had gath-ered at the cen-ter of the cy-cle con-tained bits of in and out in-tent, and she pulled that qi back into the cy-cle and turned it, try-ing to be con-scious of that in-tent as well as she turned it, and as she did, the qi seemed to im-prove once more. When that qi fin-ished its turn-ing and gath-ered at the cy-cle's thorn, she could tell that it was whiter, but not white. Clean-er, but still wrong in a way that she could not yet de-tect.

  Al-though she was ea-ger to try and pro-duce the purest qi, she calmed her-self, tak-ing this ad-van-tage for what it was. So far, Kuli was do-ing a good job ex-plain-ing things to her, but she knew that hop-ing to un-der-stand fur-ther lay-ers of aether was too much for her to ex-pect, now. Sobon had spo-ken of the na-tures of aether as in-escapably true, but also had spo-ken of very com-pli-cat-ed things as though they were sim-ple, and Ki'el was sure that what-ev-er came next would be that sort of thing.

  So she med-i-tat-ed for a while longer, try-ing to re-fine her un-der-stand-ing of this qi-clean-ing pow-er cy-cle, and when she had cleansed a rea-son-able amount of qi, Kuli di-rect-ed her to breathe it into her dant-ian, us-ing care-ful in-tent.

  The sen-sa-tion that came when she did was an awak-en-ing. Ki'el had felt her dant-ian open-ing up when she passed the tri-al that Sobon had guid-ed her through, the one that brought her Qi to the first star of Gold, and she had dim-ly sensed some of her aether leak-ing into a spir-i-tu-al vol-ume with-in her. But now that she breathed in clean qi, she sensed some-thing more. Parts of her that had been qui-et stirred to life. Some-thing with-in her that had nev-er known strength stirred, and she be-gan to won-der if she could sim-ply... per-form a qi tech-nique, as she had ma-nip-u-lat-ed aether be-fore.

  Kuli was silent on this mat-ter, and so Ki'el at-tempt-ed to re-lease qi from her right hand. There was... some con-fu-sion with-in her, as the qi in-side of her core was not from the same place that she drew her aether, and the path from her dant-ian to her hand was not the same as... as...

  How had Ki'el even ma-nip-u-lat-ed aether? How did she ma-nip-u-late qi? She blinked, feel-ing a shock run through her sys-tem, as sud-den-ly things that had once made sense sud-den-ly seemed for-eign, im-pos-si-ble. It should--

  { BREATHE. }

  Ki'el sucked in a breath, greed-i-ly, and then breathed out. Once she had done so, she be-came aware of her-self as a per-son sit-ting on a rock, hold-ing her breath be-cause she had cho-sen to breathe out but not yet cho-sen to breathe in again. And she chose to breathe deeply, again, in and out, and chose again in the mo-ment af-ter that, un-cer-tain of what had tran-spired.

  { Qi and aether are not meant to co-ex-ist, } Kuli told her. { Not meant to, but they can. The part of you that deals with qi was con-fused. But it is only a part of you, Ki'el. You can han-dle qi, and you han-dle aether. You can do both things. You have more than a sin-gle part. }

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Ki'el forced her-self to choose breath-ing, time and time again, but her mind felt par-a-lyzed, even as Kuli con-tin-ued to qui-et-ly coach her. And in time, breath-ing start-ed to seem like the nat-ur-al thing to do, and she no longer need-ed to choose. And when she reached for her qi, it felt strange, and when she reached for aether, it felt strange. How-ev-er, both qi and aether were still there.

  Ki'el sat there for a long while be-fore at last Kuli seemed to switch the way she talked. { You are go-ing to be fine, } Kuli said, { but you must stop for now. The parts of you that deal with qi and aether must rest. Do not wor-ry. What you have done is right, and you will be able to do more, lat-er. }

  Ki'el forced her-self to her feet, feel-ing a lit-tle strange, and looked out over the world be-yond her. And al-though Kuli had said noth-ing about it, Ki'el looked out over that world and felt bet-ter be-cause of it. Be-cause it was a very large world out there, full of a great many things, and a great many peo-ple. Each of them would be dif-fer-ent, and each of them had their own prob-lems, their own ad-van-tages.

  Ki'el took a last deep breath as she looked out at the world be-low, and thought to her-self. The worst time in my life was be-ing alone. When no one would help me. But Sobon, and Kuli, and Mian and Xam, and per-haps Chi-an, they will help me, and I will help them. The times in my life when I had no help are gone. I am go-ing to be fine.

  Ki'el turned away from that view know-ing in her heart that those things were true, and they helped a great deal.

  When Ki'el re-turned, she found Mian sit-ting out-side with a rather de-pressed pos-ture, al-though once she was clos-er and look-ing at his face, she de-cid-ed that the man might only be in med-i-ta-tion. In-stead of in-ter-rupt-ing, she sat down near him, con-sid-er-ing every-thing that she'd seen, and whether she could pro-vide any sort of ben-e-fit to the man.

  When she con-sid-ered Mian... the cen-tral piece she knew of his cul-ti-va-tion was that Sobon has as-so-ci-at-ed the man's spir-it with his heart and blood, the same way Ki'el's spir-it was as-so-ci-at-ed with her skin. Where she want-ed to keep for-eign things out, Mian's qi sup-pos-ed-ly want-ed the whole body to be as one, all with-in reach of his soul and source of pow-er. And that... more than any-thing, that re-mind-ed Ki'el very firm-ly of the riv-er stones, and most specif-i-cal-ly, the Out-flow-ing aether of the pair. Al-though she was not en-tire-ly clear on how the body worked, with-in, a heart that pumped blood through the body, in a cy-cle, was not un-like an in-fi-nite flow out that still re-turned to its source.

  In spite of the di-rec-tion her thoughts were turn-ing, Ki'el was still star-tled when Mian spoke. "Ki'el. You could have said some-thing."

  "You seemed to be think-ing," Ki'el said, straight-en-ing to look at him. "How have you been?"

  "Bet-ter since I heard you aren't in trou-ble." He turned in place to look at her. "The peo-ple watch-ing from the win-dows say you drove a de-mon-ic cul-ti-va-tor to mad-ness with words alone and he struck out at an El-der try-ing to es-cape. But they also laughed when they said it, and it's hard to un-der-stand what's so fun-ny." Mian's face didn't change as he spoke, and Ki'el be-gan to un-der-stand that the look was wor-ried--very wor-ried. "I'd like to hear more--but maybe we wait un-til Xam is back."

  "I'm not sure how much more there is to say," Ki'el said. "It seemed to be be-cause of a bracelet, one that let the wear-er con-trol oth-ers, but which was..." How could she say more? In-deed, what more did she re-al-ly know? She shook her head. "Sis-ter Futi asked me not to spread ru-mors, but if there is a 'de-mon-ic' thing in-volved, it was that. Or, 'that' was in-volved some-how."

  Mian grunt-ed, think-ing, and Ki'el changed the top-ic as smooth-ly as she could. "Mian. Do you re-call what Sobon said about Out-er Aether?"

  "Out-er?"

  "Gen-e-sis," she cor-rect her-self af-ter a mo-ment. "The aether that seems to flow end-less-ly out."

  "Only a lit-tle," Mian said, lean-ing back. "Maybe... not much more than what you said, re-al-ly. Did she re-al-ly say much more than that?"

  Ki'el paused, but brushed past the ques-tion. "When I was do-ing an as-sign-ment yes-ter-day, col-lect-ing riv-er stones, I found a pair of them that seemed to be re-lat-ed to that pair of flows, one al-ways out-ward, one al-ways in-ward. I... did not col-lect them," she ad-mit-ted, with a gri-mace, "but I re-mem-ber them clear-ly. But I was think-ing also of what Sobon said about your Heart cen-ter."

  "My heart," Mian said, con-sid-er-ing. "A sin-gle lo-ca-tion where blood al-ways flows out, and al-ways flows in. I can see the com-par-i-son, but I'm not sure..." he frowned.

  Ki'el knew there was some-thing there, and men-tal-ly prod-ded Kuli, who sur-faced a thought. "Part of what Sobon said was that Out--that Gen-e-sis Aether push-es en-er-gy into things, and Con-sump-tion Aether pulls it out. If this is a part of your na-ture, then it stands to rea-son that you will..." she paused, un-sure of what ex-act-ly she was say-ing, and al-though she was sure Kuli knew, the girl with-in her did not say, Ki'el as-sumed so that ei-ther she or Mian would fig-ure it out on their own.

  "I'm still qi gath-er-ing," Mian said, slow-ly, as Ki'el searched for words. "So for now, the part of the heart that is al-ways pulling is more rel-e-vant, isn't it? Only... I don't know that that's how hearts work. If an an-i-mal or per-son is cut open, they bleed, but noth-ing from the body pulls." He reached up and tapped his chin, then looked at Ki'el. "Do you have any way to demon-strate the flows?"

  Ki'el con-sid-ered, and even tried to fo-cus on the aether around her, but she was un-clear on how to do that. Sobon had cre-at-ed cy-cles specif-i-cal-ly for out-er and in-ner aether, but she could not. The only thing that made her think it was at all pos-si-ble was that Sobon had said all the aethers were pre-sent with-in qi it-self.

  Fi-nal-ly, she shook her head. "There must be a way," she said. "But I do not know it. I wish that I could share the mem-o-ry. It felt... nat-ur-al." She gave Mian an apolo-getic look.

  "De-scribe it, then," Mian said, lean-ing back.

  And so Ki'el spent some time try-ing to find dif-fer-nt ways to de-scribe those thoughts and feel-ings, of the wa-ter push-ing in, but also, the wa-ter slip-ping away, un-til the pair of stones be-came that pair of con-cepts, a pair that be-came a sin-gle thought when put to-geth-er. And Mian sat with his eyes closed, breath-ing deeply, and Ki'el could feel his qi stir-ring, as he tried to un-der-stand his own heart in the de-scrip-tion of the flow-ing riv-er.

  Un-til at last there was a mo-ment, and a strange mo-ment at that, when Mian opened his eyes, and there was a strange sense to the aether around him, but a very weak feel-ing over-all. And Ki'el though that the aether around him was touched by his spir-it, and most like-ly also flowed back into him.

  And Ki'el re-al-ized as he did this that he had no way to pu-ri-fy his qi, and felt sor-row-ful, be-cause she un-der-stood that the qi in this place was not pure. And she frowned, and thought about what she had ex-pe-ri-enced with her bend-ing of qi, hop-ing that she could find a way to share the method, or change it so that it fit Mian.

  "I think this will help," Mian said, his voice a touch dis-tract-ed, but he blinked it away and looked at her. "...You have con-cerns?"

  Ki'el con-sid-ered, un-sure of how se-ri-ous to be, and prod-ded Kuli, but the aug-ment sug-gest-ed that they had time. So Ki'el blinked away her con-fu-sion and nod-ded. "Yes, but I be-lieve it can wait. Only... try to find places where the qi... or the aether is pure. It is... not great, here."

  "I can't tell," Mian said, glanc-ing around, and Ki'el re-al-ized that they were sit-ting on the edge of a small gar-den plot, in an area that was... hand-some, in its own way. Not per-fect-ly kept, but some-one clear-ly did keep it. "Where would you rec-om-mend? Wher-ev-er you were ear-li-er?"

  Ki'el frowned at that. "Per-haps not there. And I don't know that I will go back there too of-ten, not af-ter mak-ing en-e-mies."

  Mian start-ed to say some-thing, but stopped him-self. "I see. But didn't your en-e-my get killed by an El-der?"

  "He was ma-nip-u-lat-ed. And that ar-ti-fact was tak-en, but there may be some-one be-hind it." Ki'el shook her head. "I do not know. But I in-tend to be cau-tious."

  "Bet-ter than Sobon in that re-spect," Mian said, with a bit of a jok-ing tone, and Ki'el smiled back at him, though she knew that she had been in-cau-tious more than a few times her-self. Most like-ly, she would be again. But she was also not go-ing to be dis-mis-sive of an un-known threat. And also... Sobon had spent much of his time... her time build-ing cau-tious-ly up. It was only her en-e-mies throw-ing them-selves at her that forced her hand.

  "But any-way," Mian said sud-den-ly, slap-ping his legs and stand-ing up, "I was wait-ing for you to show you to our 'room', such as it is, since you didn't come back last night. Re-mem-ber that we were en-ti-tled to one for our first month, at least." He start-ed to-wards the en-trance, and Ki'el got to her feet and fol-lowed. "It's one of the bro-ken ones, as you might guess, with patchy floors and lit-tle walls. The Floor Leader says that it is ours for that pe-ri-od."

  Ki'el had to pause as they ap-proached the in-fu-ri-at-ing spi-ral stair-case. Mian con-tin-ued up a half ro-ta-tion, paus-ing when he saw her hes-i-tate. "It's aw-ful," he said, sound-ing sym-pa-thet-ic, "but I think we can get used to it."

  "It is an in-sult," Ki'el said, forc-ing her-self to step to the stairs and take the first one, gin-ger-ly. "Call-ing it a way to train is cru-el. It feels like tor-ture."

  "I can't say I un-der-stand that," Mian said, speak-ing slow-ly and mak-ing his way up with care-ful steps, "but I agree it's more like-ly some-one be-ing a jerk rather than some kind of tool to help us.

  Ki'el fol-lowed up to the fourth floor, seething silent-ly the whole way, and con-tin-ued to feel in-sult-ed even as Mian led her two door-ways down the hall, past where they had stopped be-fore. It was... worse than Ki'el might have imag-ined, be-cause the floor was most-ly gone ex-cept for a few patch-es and for the sup-ports. And the walls...

  Ki'el caught sight of some-one else in the neigh-bor-ing room, a man who might once have been hand-some, and was now marked by age and a lack of care. When he sensed her eyes on him and turned, Ki'el saw noth-ing in the man's face but de-spair and re-sent-ment. Like so many of those she had seen in the morn-ing, it was hard to imag-ine the man wish-ing to be here. And yet... could he not leave? Was there some oth-er thing bind-ing peo-ple to the Less-er House, if they failed to ad-vance?

  Ki'el shiv-ered and looked away, back to the floor. At least the floor's struc-ture was in-tact; Ki'el, when she bent down and looked clos-er, saw signs that those beams had even been re-paired, most like-ly by the sect mem-bers who Sect Sis-ter Lan Wu had com-plained about.

  Ki'el took sev-er-al steady-ing breaths, push-ing down the part of her that want-ed to be in-sult-ed. It was eas-i-er for her, she sus-pect-ed, than for many here. Liv-ing in the ru-ins of her vil-lage had left her with few il-lu-sions about the fair-ness of fate. It was... cru-el, she thought, that she had to grasp on to those lessons again af-ter so long, and be-cause of the Sect it-self, but she did it.

  In-stead of fo-cus-ing on why it was re-quired, Ki'el did her best to fo-cus on the ques-tion that mat-tered: how would they re-pair the floor?

  Her mind strayed to the in-scrip-tions Sobon had used to turn sand to quartz. Al-though she didn't un-der-stand the in-scrip-tions, she had done her best to mem-o-rize both the form of the in-scrip-tions and the in-tent be-hind them. With the help of Kuli, Ki'el imag-ined that she could repli-cate it, even if Kuli was of-ten silent so that she could learn on her own. But... the quartz that Sobon had formed was also com-plete-ly clear, and that made it the wrong ma-te-r-i-al for floors and walls. The more prac-ti-cal an-swer was for Ki'el to do what the sect ex-pect-ed--sim-ply take the tools and ma-te-ri-als from the sect to make ba-sic wood-en walls and floor, and with time and care, shape them into the right form.

  De-pend-ing on the tools, it might not even be dif-fi-cult, and yet Ki'el dis-agreed with the thought. The tasks that need to be done, need to be done, Ki'el thought, and they may need to be done a cer-tain way. But this task is only about the re-sults, is it not? If we can ac-com-plish it while learn-ing to do more with qi, or aether, then per-haps we should.

  It was not ex-pect-ed of peo-ple in the Less-er House, she knew. Those here were not ex-pect-ed to fig-ure out new ways to use qi all by them-selves. Ei-ther they re-lied on script-ed ar-ti-facts, or knowl-edge from their up-bring-ing. Per-haps some few prodi-gies were giv-en chances to learn while they were here--but it had to be few, giv-en the at-ti-tude every-one had to-wards the Less-er House. This was a place that seemed to ex-ist only to make sure even the most tal-ent-ed and pow-er-ful ini-ti-ates suf-fered be-fore pass-ing through.

  "Ki'el?" Mian's voice was con-cerned, and Ki'el looked up at him. "You don't have to do it all alone, you know. Xam and I are al-ready talk-ing about it, mak-ing plans. We'll get this re-paired."

  Ki'el nod-ded, re-luc-tant-ly, and stood, but looked back at the re-paired floor struc-ture. There was no deny-ing, with that re-pair, that the sect had sim-ply de-cid-ed on a rule, and the peo-ple who did the re-pair car-ried it out. There were signs of it every-where, she knew, but this... stung her. It felt like this would be a very dif-fi-cult place to sleep, be-yond hav-ing no pri-va-cy. And... al-though the ring that Xam car-ried had thin mat-tress-es for each of them, the idea of sleep-ing across the sup-ports re-mained com-plete-ly un-ap-peal-ing.

  Kuli? Is there any way to fix this to-day?

  Ki'el could tell even be-fore her aug-ment replied that Kuli did not par-tic-u-lar-ly en-joy hav-ing to say no. { If you wish to use a vari-ant of Mas-ter Sobon's pat-terns, I could help, } she said, { but the pat-terns you saw were meant to be writ-ten as a script, not used freely. You would need to en-grave them, and you would need ma-te-r-i-al. But I think you miss an ob-vi-ous an-swer. }

  Ki'el's head perked up, with-out be-ing con-scious of how that might look to some-one else. An ob-vi-ous an-swer?

  { Your sword, } Kuli replied, { and Mas-ter Sobon's base-ment. Straight walls of pure aether, de-fined by rigid points. It is not a per-ma-nent fix for the room, but if you sim-ply need a floor, and walls, to-day... it might be pos-si-ble. }

  Ki'el con-sid-ered that, though she was a lit-tle sur-prised that Kuli had sug-gest-ed it. Sobon had been much more se-cre-tive. I would still need to en-grave some-thing.

  { You would, } Kuli agreed. { And it would take prac-tice. It is pos-si-ble, but not easy. But far bet-ter than try-ing to sleep on a bro-ken floor. }

  Ki'el agreed with that, and blinked away her con-cen-tra-tion to look up at Mian. "I have an idea," she said. "I may be busy for a lit-tle while."

  Mian just shrugged. "If you don't need to do sect work, then by all means. For me... I be-lieve Sis-ter Futi is al-ready call-ing for me. I just want-ed to make sure you knew about the room."

  Ki'el nod-ded, and the two start-ed back down the hall-way, Ki'el men-tal-ly go-ing over what she un-der-stood about Sobon's en-grav-ings, with lim-it-ed help from her new fa-vorite sis-ter.