Authors: Lisanne Norman
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Sorli sat with Master Esken in his study. They were going over the results of the last three weeks' tests with Kusac.
"I'd like your opinion on the latest tests first, Kusac," said Master Esken, picking up his comp note pad.
"You have the results, Master Esken," said Kusac. "I don't know that I can add anything to them."
"Our results have been interpreted objectively by the testers. We now need your insight into how you felt about both the tests and their outcome. Many of these include skills we don't have. Whether we ever did possess them is the topic that Sorli has been looking into. We'll hear his results as we go through the list."
"I'll start with divining, then. We tried the metal rods as suggested, and as you see, neither Carrie nor I had any luck with them. What we did find was that if I was in the room when Carrie was trying, the rods swung round to me. When I wasn't in the room, the rods turned completely round and pointed to Carrie. The same happened when I tried it. We seem to create too strong a field for them to work. We obtained the same result when we tried to use the pendulums over maps. This doesn't appear to be a talent either of us possess."
"Sorli? What about the Sholan control group?"
"No luck with the rods, but one of the group had some success with the pendulum," said Sorli. "If one has it, there will probably be others."
Master Esken nodded. "Anything about it in the Guild Archives?"
"Nothing at all," said Sorli.
"Teleporting was next." Kusac looked up at his tutor and the Guild Master and grinned. "We sat there and thought about moving, but nothing happened. If the Terrans could ever do it, they didn't tell anyone how."
"This was an ability mentioned in passing in the encyclopedia," Sorli said hurriedly. "We didn't expect anyone to be able to do it."
"I take it no one in the control group succeeded either," said Master Esken with a gentle smile.
"No, Master Esken. We did verify that it wasn't possible for either species to do it, though."
"If it's mentioned, then some Terran must have appeared to do it," said Kusac."Carrie is only one Terran after all, and she's hardly representative of her kind now." His tone had become more than a little sharp.
"People have been said to disappear suddenly," said Sorli. "Unfortunately there was no record of them suddenly reappearing elsewhere. It was worth trying since it would be a useful talent to have."
"I think that's a test we can keep on our list for the Terrans when they arrive," said Master Esken.
Kusac's ears pricked forward. "Terrans arriving?"
"Your father sent us word that the first Terrans with Talents similar to Carrie's will arrive from Earth in eight weeks."
"Father's moved fast."
"I believe it was your mother's doing," said Master Esken. "It will be good for your Leska to have people from her own world to speak to."
"Earth is no longer her home world," said Kusac. "Carrie's a Keissian, and I don't think she'll want to socialize with the Terrans."
"What's she doing today?" asked Sorli.
"She's out with Taizia and some of her friends, answering an interminable number of questions about Terrans, Keiss, and how we met. She's getting more than a little embarrassed by their questions, but Taizia is stopping them from getting too personal," he said, returning to studying his comp pad again.
Sorli raised an eye ridge to the Guild Master who acknowledged it with the smallest of flick of an ear.
As you said, their link gives them constant detailed in-
formation about each other,
Master Esken sent on a tight personal level.
"Distant viewing was next," said Master Esken.
"That was a lot more successful," said Kusac, looking up at them again. "The test was set up as it was in the article, random locations, randomly chosen and in our case, visited by non-telepaths."
"These tests were particularly valid in Carrie's case as she doesn't know our world, yet she still identified the sites in surprisingly accurate detail," said Sorli.
"Hardly surprising, considering what we did on Keiss," said Kusac. "Both of us scored well on those tests."
"I see the distances between you and the target sites were quite varied, ranging from near to the other side of the continent," said Esken. "It seems that distance was no barrier. Were you able to decide whether you saw through the eyes of the visitors or were actually there yourselves?"
"We both felt that we were actually there. We saw things from a bird's eye view as well as from ground level. We could see details of the sites that the visitor couldn't because of their restricted angle of view. I'd say conclusively that our minds were actually there."
"How did our people do?"
"Very well. Everyone picked up something in the test, even if it wasn't enough to absolutely pinpoint the location."
"Anything in the archives?" Esken asked Sorli.
"Nothing."
"With such positive results from you and the controls, this isn't likely to be another crossover talent," said Master Esken. "It's one you used on Keiss before your Link was completed, Kusac. Perhaps it's a Sholan Talent we've been unaware of because we've concentrated mainly on telepathy. The control group also had some success with this talent, I see. I'm sure we'll find a use for it. Perhaps locating missing persons, checking security measures— who knows."
"I'm sure the military will find a good use to put it to," Sorli murmured. "A little extra information on the Chemerians wouldn't go amiss in their eyes."
"Then we do what we have always done, we use our code of ethics to refuse the military," said Master Esken calmly. "It infringes upon a person's right to privacy."
"You'll find the Terrans less ethical," reminded Kusac. "When they arrive, you'll have to impress on them the need to respect each other's privacy."
"We're already working on an induction program for their arrival at the guild, Kusac. Their course of studies with us is already being mapped out with the aid of our colleagues in AlRel. Your father's involved in it as a matter of fact."
"I know. He's requested me to compile a study of the Keissians, with particular attention to Carrie's own skills."
"That should be interesting," said Master Esken. "I trust you'll have a copy for us?"
"Certainly, but I don't know how long it will take. We've both been constantly busy since we recovered from that virus."
"I'm glad Vanna was able to contain the infection. Now is not a good time for the guild to have an epidemic running riot," said Sorli.
"There's never a good time for epidemics," said Master Esken. "Let's move on to the last test. Healing, I believe. Now that's a Talent which we do have, and we used our own testing system. How do you assess the results, Kusac?"
"Of the eight categories in healing, we can both do six. They are, identifying the site of an injury, identifying the type of injury, reducing the pain, reducing the extent of the injury, accelerating the healing process, and healing minor injuries like bruises and pulled muscles." Kusac looked up from his comp. "Carrie wasn't able to duplicate what she did with my bitten shoulder on Keiss. That unfortunately looks like it might have been unique. Likewise, I can't close open wounds at all or heal major injuries like tissue damage and broken bones."
"What about controlling your own pain?" asked Master Esken. "It says you were able to do that, but Carrie couldn't."
"Under lab conditions, and when I was hurt during the crash on Keiss, yes, I was able to control my pain, but not later after the Challenge, or after I was shot in the Valtegan base. Again, it seems to be an undependable skill with us. Carrie can't work on herself at all. The tests showed she has the ability to heal a variety of conditions in others, so perhaps her inability to work on herself is psychological."
Master Esken nodded. "That sounds a reasonable hypothesis. What do you think caused the block? Sorli thought perhaps she'd desensitized herself due to the horrific link she had with her twin sister."
Kusac shook his head. "No. I think it was because her sister prevented her. You have my report on that link. In it I said that Elise pushed all her pain to Carrie, and that because Carrie expected her to do that, and didn't realize her sister was using her, she not only accepted the pain but actually took it from her. There may also have been the fact that she never tried to block either her own pain or her sister's."
"Perhaps she just wasn't aware she could," suggested Sorli.
"Only practice will remove the block," said Master Esken. "What about yourself? You tested negatively on healing both as a child and when you worked with the medics four years ago. Why the sudden change?"
"Perhaps I was approaching it the wrong way. Need is a great incentive," he said. "We all know that each of us is an individual and works slightly differently from the next person. Perhaps I never found the right trigger to release my healing ability until I was on Keiss."
"What about the fact that you'd already touched Carrie's mind and established an early Link with her? Even though the Link was incomplete, could that have been enough to create a crossover of abilities from her to you?"
"I doubt it, Master Esken," said Kusac. "She had never tried to heal anyone at that time."
"She would still have had the ability to do it even then."
"Who knows?" said Sorli. "We can speculate till tomorrow and never know conclusively."
Esken nodded. "You're right, of course." He sat back in his chair and looked across his desk at Kusac and Sorli. "What about Carrie? In your opinion, has she acquired any skills from you?"
"Not skills. I taught her how to use her telepathic abilities," said Kusac. "Once the initial Leska Link was forged, she knew what I could do with my Talent. That gave her the confidence to try what were to her totally new techniques."
"We've also been guilty of failing to push the boundaries of our Talent forward," said Sorli. "It's taken the discovery of the Terrans to make us wake up to the fact that we aren't the only telepathic species and that for too long we've sat on our Talent and assumed no one could rival us. Now we know otherwise. We need to explore our own abilities in the light of these findings."
"It does indeed appear that we've been ignoring a wealth of Talents that we didn't realize existed till now," said Master Esken slowly. "If nothing else, Carrie's link to you has taught us a great deal about our own abilities. I wonder why none of these skills was ever mentioned in the archives. Could it be in their desire to breed for telepaths, the guild ignored these other Talents, considering them lesser than telepathy?"
"Perhaps during the years that followed the Cataclysm only telepathy and healing were considered worth training," suggested Sorli.
Master Esken sighed. "I suspect you're right. What need had they of distant viewing when thoughts were all that was needed to communicate over large distances? What use was knowing an object's past history when they were struggling to avoid starvation? Moving small objects is amusing, but it didn't help rebuild their towns and Guild Houses. I wonder how many more Talents we've learned to ignore in the past thousand years."
"Well, we've two choices ahead of us. Do we start testing everyone in the guild for these Talents now, or do we wait until the Terrans arrive so we can include them?"
"Start now," said Sorli. "We'll have our hands full when the Terrans arrive."
Kusac nodded. "I agree. Not only that, but you can start training our people now. When the Terrans arrive, the system will be in operation and it'll be easier slotting them into a fully integrated program rather than adding on extra classes later."
"Very well, I'll broach the matter tomorrow at the staff meeting. Sorli, can you present a first draft for the proposed course at that meeting?"
"If I can call on the personnel I need, Master Esken. One of those people is Kusac. No one knows more about these skills than he does."
"By all means include him. You're in rather an anomalous position here at the guild anyway, Kusac. Neither a student nor a tutor but a mixture of both. Your Leska is the one we need to teach."
"Tell me about it," Kusac murmured, switching off his comp. "I'm here so you can study me and see what I've become now that my mind is linked with an alien's."
Sorli looked startled. Master Esken merely smiled. "I'd have been disappointed in you if you'd failed to realize that," he said. "Thank you both for your insights into the test results. I'd better let you get on with your work if you're to have it ready for tomorrow."
Sorli and Kusac rose.
"Good day, Master Esken," said Sorli, inclining his head before turning toward the door.
The Guild Master looked up from his comm. "Would you mind remaining a moment longer, Sorli? I need a few more minutes of your time."
"Good day, Master Esken, Tutor Sorli," said Kusac, opening the door and closing it softly behind him.
"Sorli, sit down again, please. Normally we don't involve ourselves in civil matters, but I'm concerned about these two. You're constantly involved with the training of our Leska pairs. Just how close are they?"
"Closer than if they had been born Talented twins," said Sorli. "As you observed for yourself, there is a constant communication between them. Unlike Sholan Leskas, they don't have to search for the knowledge of what their partner is doing, they know."
"That's what I thought from the data I've been sent by their physician and by you. It's a damned shame she isn't a Sholan. If she had been, then there might have been a chance of his father trying to negate this life-bonding contract with Vailkoi. It would also mean we wouldn't have a problem over their ability to fight. As it is, I'm afraid they're both going to be bitterly disappointed. How do you think Kusac will react?"
"I believe Kusac will disobey his father if it comes to it," said Sorli thoughtfully. "He's equally determined to have Carrie as his legal lifemate. Has anyone stopped to consider what the effect would be on the Terran if Kusac does marry and mate with Rala? Since they're bound so closely, I feel sure the effect would be devastating to both of them. She'd be sharing his intimacy while he mated with Rala."
"That's just another problem they'll have to face when they come to it, along with Konis' wrath when he finds out Kusac has given the human his torc," sighed Master Esken. "It's at times like these that I'm glad to take the coward's way out and claim political and civil neutrality. It isn't up to us to inform him about Kusac's unofficial betrothal gift to her."
"Hardly the coward's way, Master, more the diplomat's."