Page 10 of To Scale the Emerald Mountain
I inhale my food, not realizing before just how famished I was. The bread is delicious. The dried meat is spiced beautifully and dried to the most perfect textured jerky.
“So, you made the dough and jerky yourself, then?” I ask Locane.
“I did.”
“You don’t seem like a man that would enjoy cooking or baking.”
“And what would you presume a man like me would enjoy doing?” he asks with a quirked brow.
Taking in his stance, arms folded across his chest and legs straight out in front of him, I consider my answer. “I don’t know, but I wouldn’t guess any decidedly domestic duties.”
“Well, seeing as I live alone, all domestic duties are decidedly mine,” he says with a bite.
“Right.” I swallow. “How far are we from your home?”
“Not far, about two days. We should reach the base of the mountain sometime tomorrow evening if we move swiftly. After that, about another day.” His eyes pop up at me. “You throw a fantastic punch, by the way.”
“Oh, a compliment for me?” I deadpan with a smile.
“Funny. Seriously, you do,” he says, with that same blank face of his that I’m starting to feel like I know.
“Well, thank you. I must have had an excellent teacher,” I tell him happily.
“Yes. It seems so.” Even though he’s agreed, there’s an odd tone to his voice, akin to disapproval.
We fall into a comfortable silence, listening to the symphony of crickets as the sky finishes its transition to the inky black of night. The stars wink in the night sky as I think about who that teacher may have been. I’ve spent the last two weeks scouring my brain for any scrap of information on my life before. It usually leaves me with a pounding headache, like my brain has been scrubbed raw by a rough steel sponge.
Fully basking in the sounds of nature, I feed off of the strange energy of Locane, and my muscles loosen as I settle in for the night.
“That’s it, good hit, darling girl! Where you may be small, you are fast. And your speed gives you better opportunities to hit those weak spots while they’re open.”
Backing away from the man holding his side, I turn and grin at the source of praise—a small woman with chestnut hair, matching mine. Her face almost looks ageless, other than the fine laugh lines around her kind hazel eyes.
My grandmother.
“Thanks, Nana!” I yell enthusiastically.
“No need to thank me, Elly. You’re the one that has done the work.”
I’m twelve and new to training. This is my first true victory, besting a man twice my age, more than twice my size.
Leaning my wooden staff by the polished door of the quaint stone cottage, Nana comes to my side and gives me a tight squeeze.“I am so proud of you.”
That pride swells in my chest as I’m wrapped in a familiar and comforting presence.
Nana herself trained with the Bokhaiish in the island region just off the southwestern coast of the Mother Continent. The Imperial Islands of Bokhaii is a sovereign nation, completely separate from the Territories and the Kingdoms. It’s an honor for an outsider to be trained personally by the Bokhaiish with their sacred techniques. The fighting style with the traditional wooden staff is a true art form. I insisted on learning the art as well.
Though I’m not able to train in the exotic islands where the fighting style originated, Nana hired a native that had relocated to the Emerald Mountains, Taiik, to help with my training.
The first time I held a staff it felt right, like an extension of my arms, flowing beyond my finger tips to become one with my body. Nana and Taiik both claim that I’m a natural, but today is special.This is the day I landed my first blow on the staff master. The light of my victory pulses in time with my adrenaline.
Nana hasn’t fought with me yet, only overseeing my sessions with Taiik.
“You are not ready yet, darling girl,” she tells me every time I ask.
Taiik tells me that she’s legendary in Bokhaii, although he is too young to have seen her in action during her prime. We are both dying to see her fight. I have been since I was a small child, Nana telling me bedtime stories about her adventures across the world. For a long time, I thought they were nothing more than nursery stories. The products of a fantastical and imaginative mind trying to entertain a small girl who did not want to go to sleep.
I believed the stories were real the day Nana showed me her favorite staff. Her weapon is made of rare fenwood. The nearly extinct tree only grows in Bokhaii, at the base of an active volcano where black basalt rock meets nutrient dense soil of the rainforests around it—a rainforest that thrives on the living magic the moons provide. Not only is the landscape of Bokhaii fueled by the light of the moons, it powers the lunar Shifter gifts of the island peoples as well.
