Drizzt performed every pose to near perfection on the first or second try, and with such amazing agility and stamina in sustaining the pose that Afafrenfere was left scratching his chin and wondering if there was any benefit at all for the drow with these practices.
Still, Master Perrywinkle Shin had ordered him to do this, and Master Shin had explained that he was simply relaying the orders of Grandmaster Kane, and so how could Afafrenfere refuse, or even question?
DRIZZT WAS GROWING tired of this journey. He felt like a passenger aboard a ship he could not steer, and since that ship was his own life, this diversion to the Monastery of the Yellow Rose was, in those first few days, doing no more to him than increasing the level of his frustration.
Master Afafrenfere noted that, surely, as the days slipped past, and so did the other masters, and so on the seventh day, the monk did not come to Drizzt early in the morning to take him to Childish Grace.
Instead, a much older man, Master Perrywinkle Shin, appeared at the cloth flap blocking Drizzt’s small room from the private chambers of many others. The elderly man’s face was impassive, and he said nothing at first, just motioned for Drizzt to follow as he exited the chamber.
“You will not need those,” he did remark to Drizzt when the drow moved for his gear. “Any of it. Just the robe we have given to you.”
Drizzt hesitated a bit longer, and offered a quick glance at the older monk. In the end, he shrugged and complied, though he was certainly thinking that his passive obedience to this nonsense was nearing its end.
Master Shin led Drizzt into a small circular chamber, one of the few places Drizzt had seen inside this grand structure that had few markings, statues, or other illuminations. Drizzt hesitated before following Master Shin to the center of the room, though.
Set in the exact middle of the floor was a single large candle set on an ornate candlestick, giving Drizzt the notion that this might be a chamber of summoning. He spent a moment studying the floor, looking for some design or pentagram or runes, but as far as he could tell, it was bare and featureless.
“Come, stand opposite the candle from me,” Master Shin requested, and he took a position directly across from the door and turned back to face Drizzt.
“What being will you summon?” Drizzt asked, moving up to take his place.
“Being? Summon?”
Drizzt motioned to the candle.
“Ah,” said Master Shin. “No, my friend, I am no sorcerer. All that will be summoned here will be, I hope, a moment of emptiness.”
Drizzt didn’t know what that might mean, so he shrugged. To him, it did not matter.
Master Shin moved his feet a bit wider than shoulder-width, then turned his toes outward at a slight angle. He brought his palms together in front of his chest, as if in prayer, and slowly bent his legs, lowering himself straight down into a squat until his legs were bent slightly more than a right angle at the knee.
“Can you do this?” he asked, and closed his eyes.
Drizzt copied the movement with his legs.
“Your hands, too,” Master Shin instructed, and Drizzt thought it curious that the man, who had not opened his eyes as far as Drizzt could tell, had noted that omission.
Drizzt brought his hands together.
“Does this position pain you?” Master Shin asked.
“No.”
Perrywinkle Shin stood up, but held out his hand when Drizzt started to do likewise. The master produced a small item from the pocket of his robe, and with a flick of his fingers created a tiny flame atop it.
“Flint and steel with a wick,” Master Shin explained, lighting the candle. “We call it a fusee.” He brought the small item, the fusee, back in close, blew out its flame, and replaced it in his pocket.
“I leave you to your thoughts,” Master Shin told the drow. “Remain in that pose for as long as you are able. For as long as you are capable. To the absolute end of your endurance.”
“That could be a long time,” Drizzt remarked, but Shin seemed not to notice, or at least, not to care.
“When you must release the stance, when you have failed, please simply extinguish the candle and sit here to await my return.”
“How long?”
“That is not your concern. How long can you hold the pose? Until the candle is burned out?”
Drizzt looked at the burning candle skeptically. It was nothing one might carry through a darkened home in one hand.
“Days?” he asked.
Master Perrywinkle Shin gave a little laugh and walked out of the room.
Drizzt looked back at the candle. He pressed his palms together more solidly and strengthened his posture. He thought to softly blow on the candle—perhaps the breeze would make it burn hotter.
Or perhaps he would blow it out.
Though why would he care, after all?
He thought of Catti-brie and the great deception that had been perpetrated upon him. He thought of Menzoberranzan, his home yet never his home, and the sacrifice of Zaknafein that he had witnessed in his dream state in House Do’Urden.
Or was this a dream state, he wondered?
Who decided what was real and what an illusion, he wondered?
Who was the puppeteer, he wondered?
He thought and he wondered.
He wondered and he thought.
And his wondering was, in the end, a wandering of focus.
And so he winced often, and pressed his hands together as if trying to push the frustration right out of himself. And he tightened his legs until the muscles began to burn.
And his mind wandered and the room became a blur and the pose fell away as he fell away … into darkness.
“COME NOW,” HE heard Master Shin’s voice.
Drizzt opened his eyes. He was lying on the floor in front of the candle—he vaguely remembered squeezing out the flame between his finger and thumb after he had collapsed onto the floor. He had remained there for a very long time—hours likely—but didn’t remember falling asleep.
“You must be hungry,” the monk added, and the mention of it did indeed clue Drizzt in to the fact that he very much was.
“How long?” he asked.
Master Shin bent low to examine the candle, which was notched to determine the length of a burn.
“I mean, how long have I been in here?” the drow clarified.
“It is morning.”
Drizzt nodded, then noted the curious grin upon Master Shin’s face.
“What do you know?”
“About?”
Drizzt nodded his chin to the candle. “You are amused?”
“Surprised, really, though it was predicted.”
“What are you talking about?” the drow demanded.
“I have witnessed your morning practice routines and have heard of your great exploits in battle—from Master Afafrenfere; from the drow Jarlaxle, who brought you to this place; and from the more general rumors that sometimes whisper your name. I have no doubt that you could defeat many in this monastery in single combat, and that you have achieved such a level of skill honestly.”
He turned to the candle. “And yet, in this challenge, there are many young monks here, some not even yet worthy of the title of brother or sister, who could defeat you.”
Drizzt didn’t let his pride bubble into anger. “Perhaps I did not see it as a challenge.”
“Of course you did. You see everything in your life as a challenge.” He moved for the door, motioning for Drizzt to follow, and making that last remark, be it insult or observation or warning, the final word.
Later that same day Drizzt was back with Afafrenfere, back to the exercises, and with little explanation beyond what he had already been given. A few days later, he was squatting in front of the candle once more, to be awakened by Master Shin again, hungry, the next morning.
And so it went, day after day, seemingly without purpose.
On the occasion of Drizzt’s third visit to the candle room, when Master Shin ba
de him to assume his crouch, Drizzt didn’t comply.
“Enough of this,” he said. “I see no reason.”
“Your second attempt was no better than your first,” the master replied. “Worse, even.”
“And so I have failed.”
“That is not an option.”
“By whose reckoning?” Drizzt demanded.
“By the reckoning of everyone who cares for you. And by your own, if you were wise enough to look more deeply into your heart.”
“A grand claim.” Drizzt made sure that his voice had a biting edge to it.
Master Shin’s expression remained impassive—this one was very good at that particular effect, Drizzt thought, and it irked him more than it should have.
“Will you accept the challenge?” Master Shin asked.
“I am done with your challenges,” the drow replied. “It is time for me to go.”
Master Shin’s shrug surprised him. Drizzt had expected to be told that he could not leave.
“There is only one who would stand in your way,” the monk said instead. “Come, let us gather your things and I will show you the way out.”
Drizzt paused, trying to decipher the riddle, and stared at the empty doorway and corridor beyond for a long while after Perrywinkle Shin left the chamber. He gathered up his possessions and hurried to catch up.
“Stand in the way?” he asked skeptically. “I am a prisoner now?”
“You were a prisoner before you came here, Master Do’Urden. Indeed, that is why you were brought here and why we agreed to allow you entrance.”
He led Drizzt into a medium-sized room, comfortably decorated and with a wonderful hearth, though no fire was burning. Before that fireplace, only a single chair was set, but the room’s occupant was not using it, and was, rather, squatting in front of the hearth, staring into the ashes.
“Your disposition, your prison,” Master Shin cryptically explained, indicating the squatting man, and Shin turned and left, shutting the door behind him.
The squatting man made no move to stand, nor did he even glance back to see who had entered his chamber, and looking at him, so perfectly still, Drizzt wondered if he was even aware that he was no longer alone.
The drow let it play out, time passing without event or acknowledgement. Finally, Drizzt walked over to the chair and sat down, taking a longer look at the man’s face as he did.
This one was older than Perrywinkle Shin, his face appearing as if he was in his seventh decade, at least, perhaps even his eighth, though his muscle tone, from what Drizzt could see of that which wasn’t covered by his simple white robe, and his limberness, clearly, given that he was in a full squat, spoke of a man much younger, physically.
Drizzt understood then that this was the Grandmaster of Flowers, the legendary monk named Kane, who had fought with King Gareth in the previous century and now was somehow still alive.
Or was he? the drow wondered. He grinned, thinking he had it all sorted out. So many were still alive who should not be. It wasn’t coincidence, it was deception.
Afafrenfere had spoken of this man many times, had even claimed that Kane was with him, sharing his body, in the War of the Silver Marches—and indeed, Afafrenfere’s exploits in that war, particularly in slaying the white dragon on the side of Fourthpeak high above Mithral Hall, spoke of something quite beyond what any might expect.
Jarlaxle, too, had spoken of this man, Kane, confirming to Drizzt that he knew Kane, and that he and Entreri had met the man, even in combat, when they had come through the Bloodstone Lands that long, long time ago.
Kane made no move to acknowledge Drizzt. His eyes were open, but it didn’t seem to Drizzt that the man was seeing anything in that room at all. Drizzt got the feeling that Kane was hollow, mentally, simply empty, in a state of complete relaxation despite the stressful pose.
In watching him, Drizzt wondered if there was any physical limit on how long the man could maintain that deep squat.
Maybe this, then, was also a test of Drizzt’s patience. Would he interrupt Grandmaster Kane’s meditation, or simply wait out the man?
He decided to wait, and the day passed. Drizzt got up several times and walked around, trying to be quiet about it, at least at first, for he found that he was growing increasingly agitated here, to say nothing of the growling in his belly.
The room darkened, daylight waning.
Drizzt sat back and closed his eyes. He’d find Reverie, at least.
The voice came so unobtrusively that it took the drow a while to even realize he was being spoken to, and then some more time to understand that it was an actual voice and not some mental impartation.
“You wish to leave us,” Kane said.
“I waste my time,” Drizzt answered after a long while.
“Your entire existence is a grand deception, so you have determined,” Kane replied. “Is not time wasted no less valuable than time spent in futile and meaningless actions?”
The simple logic kept Drizzt from responding, but did nothing to lighten his irritable mood.
Kane turned his head and regarded the drow. “I would prefer that you stay. I believe that your answer is here, or at the very least, that you will find the road that leads to the answer you need.”
“If you know the answer, then tell me.”
“If I told you the answer, you would not believe me. In fact, you would likely trust me even less, yes?”
“Perhaps I trust you not at all right now.”
“As you will,” said Kane, and he turned back to the hearth. “Do you know the four elemental planes?”
Drizzt looked at him curiously. “Of course.”
“We associate with them in our teachings and our practices in the Order of the Yellow Rose,” Kane explained. “To advance the levels of the Order of the Yellow Rose, one must find peace within all four elements to the satisfaction of that rank.”
“You have to swim and run over hot coals?” Drizzt asked flippantly, and quite disrespectfully. He knew it as soon as the words left his mouth. He wished he could take it back, but felt a bit better about his mocking when Kane managed a slight chuckle and a warm smile, clearly taking no offense.
“The element of earth is the material world around us,” the Grandmaster explained. “It is our place in it and how we must manage that place, both in terms of nature and community. It is our outward morality.”
Drizzt nodded. It seemed simple enough.
“Air is the spiritual,” said Kane. “It is the hardest to define and the hardest to understand. Our place in the multiverse, our life energy contained within this mortal physical form. It is the matter of accepting limitations and understanding that we are part of something much grander all at the same time, and so, the paradox of rational existence, and the ability to find peace in the uncertainty beyond this apparent life.”
The monk’s words conjured in Drizzt one of his many nights atop of Kelvin’s Cairn, with the stars all around and the feeling that he was lifting up into them to be one with them in some grand universal scheme that remained beyond his comprehension. He understand Kane’s words quite profoundly, and his expression and nod reflected that—and that, too, drew a wide smile from Grandmaster Kane.
“Fire is the perfection of the body, the arts martial, the hardened core,” said Kane. “In this, you are quite advanced, perhaps as greatly so as any now studying at the monastery. Your skills and discipline in the realm of fire are quite remarkable.”
“As advanced as yours?” Drizzt asked, and it occurred to him that perhaps that had sounded like a challenge, and so perhaps it was.
“It would not matter,” the monk replied. “Fire is most entwined with water, and water is thought, both flowing and still. Whatever you may have attained in the manner of fire, Drizzt Do’Urden, is diminished by the dam of thought you have placed in front of your personal water. Neither stillness nor free flow are within you at this time, and so you are not nearly as formidable as you might believe. You are wounde
d and broken.”
Drizzt stared at the man hard, and almost wanted to strike out at him.
“Your feeble count at a simple meditative pose belies all that you have trained in the realm of fire,” Grandmaster Kane said.
There was no tone of insult in the man’s voice, and yet Drizzt had to tell himself repeatedly that there was no insult intended. All of his frustrations began to creep up around him again, black wings in which he knew he would be forever lost, and he wanted nothing more than to give that frustration a focus. He grimaced repeatedly, and with each grimace he noted that Kane, who was not even looking his way, nodded his chin knowingly, as if reading Drizzt’s every thought.
The demon deceiving him would know. Lolth would know.
Drizzt’s hand slid to his belted scimitar, but Kane stood up and turned to face him directly. “I do not wish for you to leave at this time. You contradict all that you have achieved and whatever memory or honor led you to that achievement in the first place. You have thrown aside your road—for whatever reason does not matter—and I wish to help you back to it.”
“Then tell me!”
“It is not a lie,” Kane said quietly. “None of this is a lie. Your life is as you perceive it to be.”
Drizzt’s expression hardly softened.
“And you cannot believe me, and indeed, now trust me less, if that was even possible. But it matters not. Stay. You have nowhere better to go.”
“Unless I am certain that there is nothing worth learning from you,” Drizzt replied.
“Then strike me dead in the arena, in single combat,” Kane said. “I will arrange our duel this very hour.”
Drizzt rocked back in his seat and stared at the monk incredulously.
“Use your blades and every trick you know,” said Kane. “Your bow, even, if you so choose.”
“In that event, I could simply stay away and shoot you dead.”
“Then this should be easy for you.”
Kane started out of the room, pausing to turn back and motion for Drizzt to follow. “Are you afraid to face me? Or are you afraid to face yourself?” the monk asked.