N. Jemisin - The Obelisk Gate

“It was put there when I was very young,” he says. He sounds weary. Fighting the silver for days on end without sleep is taking its toll. “There was no ‘why’ for me; it was simply the way things had to be.”

“But…” Nassun does not want to be annoying by asking why again. “ Did it have to be? What is it for?”

He smiles, though his eyes are shut. “We are made to keep the world safe from the dangers of your kind.”

“I know that, but…” She shakes her head. “ Who made you?”

“Me, specifically?” Schaffa opens one eye, then frowns a little. “I… don’t remember. But in general, Guardians are made by other Guardians. We are found, or bred, and given over to Warrant for training and… alteration.”

“And who made the Guardian before you, and the one before that? Who did it first ?”

He is silent for a time: trying to remember, she guesses from his expression. That something is very wrong with Schaffa, chiseling holes in his memories and putting fault-line-heavy pressure on his thoughts, is something Nassun simply accepts. He is what he is. But she needs to know why he is the way he is… and more importantly, she wants to know how to make him better.

“I don’t know,” he says finally, and she knows he is done with the conversation by the way he exhales and shuts his eyes again. “In the end, the why does not matter, little one. Why are you an orogene? Sometimes we must simply accept our lot in life.”

Nassun decides to shut up then, and a few moments later Schaffa’s body relaxes into sleep for the first time in days. She keeps watch diligently, extending her newly recovered sense of the earth to catch the reverberations of small animals and other moving things in the immediate vicinity. She can sess Umber, too, still moving methodically at the edge of her range as he sets up his snares, and because of him she weaves a thread of the silver into her web of awareness. He can evade her sessing, but not that. It will catch any commless, too, should they sneak into arrow or harpoon range. She will not let Schaffa be injured as her father was injured.

Aside from something heavy and warm that treads along on all fours not far from Umber, probably foraging, there is nothing of concern nearby. Nothing—

—except. Something very strange. Something… immense? No, its boundaries are small, no bigger than those of a mid-sized rock, or a person. But it is directly underneath the white not-stone slab. Under her feet, practically, barely more than ten feet down.

As if noticing her attention, it moves. This feels like the movement of the world. Involuntarily Nassun gasps and leans away, even though nothing changes but the gravity around her, and that only a little. The immensity whips away suddenly, as if it senses her scrutiny. It doesn’t go far, however, and a moment later, the immensity moves again: up. Nassun blinks and opens her eyes to see a statue standing at the edge of the slab, which was not there before.

Nassun is not confused. Once, after all, she wanted to be a lorist; she has spent hours listening to tales of stone eaters and the mysteries that surround their existence. This one does not look as she thought it would. In the lorist tales, stone eaters have marble skin and jewel hair. This one is entirely gray, even to the “whites” of his eyes. He is bare-chested and muscular, and he is smiling, lips drawn back from teeth that are clear and sharp-faceted.

“You’re the one who stoned the Fulcrum, a few days ago,” says his chest.

Nassun swallows and glances at Schaffa. He’s a heavy sleeper, and the stone eater didn’t speak loudly. If she yells, Schaffa will probably wake—but what can a Guardian do against such a creature? She isn’t even sure she can do anything with the silver; the stone eater is a blazing morass of it, swirls and whirls of thread all tangled up inside him.

The lore, however, is clear on one thing about stone eaters: They do not attack without provocation. So: “Y-yes,” she says, keeping her voice low. “Is that a problem?”

“Not at all. I wanted only to express my admiration for your work.” His mouth does not move. Why is he smiling so much? Nassun is more certain with every passing breath that the expression is not just a smile. “What is your name, little one?”

She bristles at the little one . “Why?”

The stone eater steps forward, moving slowly. This sounds like the grind of a millstone, and looks as wrong as a moving statue should look. Nassun flinches in revulsion, and he stills. “Why did you stone them?”

“They were wrong.”

The stone eater steps forward again, onto the slab. Nassun half expects the slab to crack or tilt beneath the creature’s terrible weight, which she knows is immense. He is a mountain, compacted into the size and shape of a human being. The slab of deadciv material does not crack, however, and now the creature is close enough for her to see the fine detailing of his individual hair strands.

“ You were wrong,” he says, in his strange echoing voice. “The people of the Fulcrum, and the Guardians, are not to blame for the things they do. You wanted to know why your Guardian must suffer as he does. The answer is: He doesn’t have to.”

Nassun stiffens. Before she can demand to know more, the stone eater’s head turns toward him. There is a flicker of… something. An adjustment too infinitely fine to see or sess, and… and suddenly, the alive, vicious throb of silver within Schaffa dies into silence. Only that dark, needle-like blot in his sessapinae remains active, and immediately Nassun sesses its effort to re-assert control. For the moment, though, Schaffa exhales softly and relaxes further into sleep. The pain that has been grinding at him for days is gone, for now.

Nassun gasps—softly. If Schaffa has the chance to truly rest at last, she will not destroy it. Instead she says to the stone eater, “How did you do that?”

“I can teach you. I can teach you how to fight his tormentor, his master , too. If you wish.”

Nassun swallows hard. “Y-yeah. I wish.” She isn’t stupid, though. “In exchange for what?”

“Nothing. If you fight his master, then you fight my enemy, too. It will make us… allies.”

She knows now that the stone eater has been lurking nearby, listening in on her, but she doesn’t care anymore. To save Schaffa… She licks her lips, which taste faintly of sulfur. The ash haze has been getting thicker in recent weeks. “Okay,” she says.

“What is your name?” If it’s been listening, it knows who she is. This is a gesture toward alliance.

“Nassun. And you?”

“I have no name, or many. Call me what you wish.”

He needs a name. Alliances don’t work without names, do they? “S-Steel.” It’s the first thing that pops into her mind. Because he’s so gray. “Steel?”

The sense that he does not care lingers. “I will come to you later,” Steel says. “When we can speak uninterrupted.”

An instant later he is gone, into the earth, and the mountain vanishes from her awareness in seconds. A moment later, Umber emerges from the forest around the deadciv slab and begins walking up the hill toward her. She’s actually glad to see him, even though his gaze sharpens as he draws nearer and sees that Schaffa is asleep. He stops three paces away, more than close enough for a Guardian’s speed.

“I’ll kill you if you try anything,” Nassun says, nodding solemnly. “You know that, right? Or if you wake him up.”

Umber smiles. “I know you’ll try.”

“I’ll try and I’ll actually do it.”

He sighs, and there is great compassion in his voice. “You don’t even know how dangerous you are. To far, far more than me.”