Off-Grid
The Tree House
It was a fine, clear evening, and the Ribbons had risen joyously to their nightly dance.
Tekelia vesterGranz stood on the balcony overlooking the shadow-filled forest, thinking.
The village meeting was scheduled for an hour hence, to be followed, naturally, by a shared meal. As village meetings went, this one bid fair to be lively. The Haosa stinted very little, least of all their emotions, and as a group they tended to feel keenly. The topic of tonight’s meeting being the welfare and safekeeping of two small orphans, emotions were certain to run both high and hot.
But it was not the meeting, nor even the children, that occupied Tekelia’s mind.
Rather, it was a pair of speaking lavender eyes in a strong, intelligent face, her quick wit, her laughter, and her moments of dense thought.
The press of her fingers, the casual rubbing of elbows, the touch of skin against skin—those were treasures beyond telling, and dangerous, too.
So very, very dangerous.
Tekelia was Haosa; it was no stretch to understand that danger was part of the attraction. Those who lived fully open to the ambient had a fine taste for peril.
And, to say truth, as an instance of Chaos Itself, Tekelia was more than a little dangerous.
Tekelia sighed, leaning elbows on the rail.
The sparkling shadows grew more vivid as the sky darkened toward full night. Soon, it would be time to leave for the meeting.
But Tekelia did not move.
Who knew that touch could be addictive?
Delightful, certainly—and a delight to which Tekelia was peculiarly vulnerable, having been without it for half a lifetime.
Children of Chaos paid for their close relationship with the ambient. They touched no one, and no one touched them, not when the mere brush of a hand would fling a person’s essence out from their body into the ambient.
Only, Padi yos’Galan remained stubbornly resident in her body, even when fully embraced, and seemed to feel not even the slightest bit unsettled.
Padi yos’Galan was a trader, from outworld and far away. Traders did not stay in one place. Particularly, young, eager traders did not stay on Colemeno when there were dozens of new markets only waiting for her to open them.
Truly, Tekelia had expected to lose the grace of her touch—eventually. To lose it now, for something so trivial as melant’i—
No, that was hardly just. Melant’i meant a great deal to Liadens, and it was a mark of regard that Padi should wish to protect Tekelia’s.
Still, it was a trivial thing, for Tekelia to transport Padi to—wherever she wished to go. While teleportation was not a common Talent, those so Gifted tended to be robust. Bentamin, Tekelia had often thought, must be especially strong, to be able to manage the distances he did, working under the Grid. As a Child of Chaos, Tekelia scarcely noticed the Grid’s effect, though—
Tekelia blinked.
It would be . . . an impertinence . . . to brand Padi yos’Galan a Child of Chaos—no. An inaccuracy. Demonstrably, her touch was harmless, even under the ambient’s full blare. However, it could not be denied that she was a very strong multi-Talent, and—perhaps—not quite Civilized. Whoever had been given the teaching of her had been strangely reticent, especially in comparison to Haosa teaching. Well. Likely her tutor had been Civilized, and only able to teach as they knew.
Still, there was nothing to say that she could not learn in the Haosa style.
It was, Tekelia thought, with a significant lightening of mood, worth a try.