The mind is capable of having many thoughts almost at once, receiving a multitude of information from the senses and interpreting all of that information simultaneously. A lord may sup at his wedding feast and savor the taste of the roasted boar prepared especially for him even as he enjoys the sound of the music playing over the din of a hundred different conversations and looking at his new, young bride, appreciating her beauty. He may think, "Ah, the gods have blessed me!" and he might mean that he has been blessed with such delicious fare, such soothing sounds or such a comely wife. He might even mean all three at once, because the complexities of the human mind allow for a man to consider things nearly at once or quickly in tandem and pass judgment on them, acting accordingly. If he enjoys the flavor of the boar, he may have another bite. If he is entertained by the song, he may cry out for his guests to dance. If he is enraptured with his new wife, he may lean over and place a kiss upon her mouth, wishing for some drunken guest to bellow about the bedding sooner rather than later.
In this same way, the Cat was receiving information from her senses, considering it all at once, and making judgments about what she should do next. She noted that the canal was deep as she plunged downward, influenced as it was by the tides. High tide must have only just occurred, judging by how far down she sank into the dark depths of the channel. She felt the chill of the tidal water, sensed the amount of air she had filling her lungs, and guessed at the number of eels like to be silently slithering about the muddy bottom of the canal where her toes had only just come to rest. She was having many thoughts at once, like a crowd of voices shouting in her head, while the overarching idea she was trying to push forward was don't panic. The rest of the information buzzing through her head was a mixture of notions and considerations, some important, some less so, at least while she was trying to solve the most pressing of her problems, which was that she now likely had just under three minutes until she would start to drown.
Thankfully, she had entered the water feet first despite the fact that the Cat had been shoved through the portal with her head leading the way. At the moment she realized she was going to fall (when she realized that her master was going to dropher), the girl called upon her memory of some of her rat-faced brother's acrobatic skills. Just as she slipped easily from the door in the lower wall of the temple toward the canal, she pulled her body into a tight ball, spinning slightly and then unfolding herself with her toes pointing downward just as she struck the water. This made it easier to get her bearings once her descent was arrested by the mucky floor of the canal. With the sort of mad humor that sometimes grips a person in times of great stress, she thought wryly that she had gotten to execute one of the Westerosi boy's moves after all, and in a more appropriate venue than the solemn temple where the idea had first struck her. There, deep below the surface of the water, trying not to waste time with gloating and smiling at her own flawless execution of the aerial tumble, she could feel the long skirt of her shift billowing up around her waist, floating weightlessly around her as she tried to think.
A thick, muscular creature with a slow, curving movement brushed slickly against her bare leg, an action which seemed to suggest that she might have another pressing problem to solve besides how best to avoid drowning. The eels in the bay were mostly of standard size, still very dangerous, but not typically deadly, per se. The eels that found their way into the canal, however… Those creatures fed upon a steady diet of flesh, settling on the muddy bottom of the channel and awaiting their sustenance (provided so conveniently at regular intervals via the iron door through which the girl had just unwillingly exited the temple). In this fashion, they grew quite large. The biggest she had ever seen was as thick around as a large man's thigh, with a mouth full of razor-like teeth, its body covered with shiny black scales that gleamed like polished armor in the sunlight (when it bothered to break the surface of the water to expose its scales to the sun, anyway).
Her thoughts became muddled, stacking one on top of the other, happening all at once. I can hold my breath for a very long time; don't panic. Gods, Jaqen… don't think about it now. The eels haven't been fed recently. I'm going to kill him. These ropes are too tight, I can't even move my ankles. Maybe I can push up from the bottom and break the surface to get a breath. It's too dark to see anything down here… oh, but I felt that. Don't panic. Eel! Don't panic! THINK! If I could somehow get the knife... There's another one, oh, there are so many! Why? Jaqen…
The water was beginning to slowly churn around her. She knew the eels would become frenzied if they scented blood, so she cast her thoughts out to the old gods and the new and the Many-Faced god and then, reluctantly, to the drowned god (suddenly feeling very sorry that she had japed about his bride being chewed), begging them to keep her from being bitten by an eel. She knew the appeal was likely useless, but she could not think of else to do at just that second. Praying and beseeching at least served to distract her from the bumping of the eels and the feel of their oily bodies grazing hers. If one of the dangerous creatures had a mind to nip her and broke her skin, it would be the end of her, and a significantly painful, messy, inauspicious end at that.
She tried her wrists again, attempting furiously to pull them apart and loosen the bonds but then felt a rather aggressive bump against her back. The girl turned quickly in the water, her open eyes just glimpsing the suggestion of the shadow of a large eel pushing past her in the small amount of moonlight that pierced the depth of the water, spinning on her toes as best she could with bound ankles. Don't bite me, she thought, directing her will at the eel. She ceased beseeching the gods and turned her prayers toward the hungry lords of the canal. Don't bite me, don't bite me, don't bite me, don't bite me!
The girl felt herself slipping into panic as another eel, this one even larger, passed her, caressing her side with his thick body. She fought against the pounding of her heart, willing it to slow, and suppressed the urge to draw in a great, watery breath with which to scream. She strove hard to avoid giving into terror because she knew that if she allowed that to happen, she was lost. If she were not under water, she could have taken a deep breath to calm herself, but as it was, she only had her thoughts for comfort. In that brief space of time she still had before losing herself to hysteria, Syrio's voice came to her.
Calm as still water.
She nodded almost imperceptibly as if acknowledging Syrio's expertise in the matter of remaining calm. But then, strangely, his words were pushed aside and it was the Kindly Man's voice she heard ringing in her ears.
When you truly find a moment of stillness, you will learn it is neither life nor death. It is great strength and acute awareness.
Stillness.
The girl was bumped again by a thick-bodied monster, causing her to rock slightly forward and she struggled to keep her balance. She stared hard, her lungs beginning to burn, trying to watch the eel, seeing if it was going to turn and charge her. As her feet planted themselves firmly in the thick, slimy muck at the canal's floor, she suddenly felt almost weightless, as if she were drifting, moving smoothly, gliding instinctively toward a… almost a smell. A smell like… food? She pushed forward, just passing the point where the smell, if that's what it was, was strongest, feeling her long, sleek sides caress the warm flesh of the thing she wanted to eat. She made a graceful turn in the water, and headed back to where the smell had originated. She saw nothing, but she sensed that it was there. She butted her head against the thing and felt herself, felt her body as it gave a little to the pressure of her great eel head. She passed the long, sleek eel body over the arms pulled back behind her, and knew what she had to do. The eel circled back, its will now belonging to another. She approached herself from behind, her still, lithe form standing upright, trying to hold herself steady against the push and pull of the gentle current and the occasional bumping of the eels against her legs.
The jaws of the eel opened wide, sharp teeth like tiny knives lining the mouth, and clamped down hard near the bound hands. The jaws locked and the great head of the monster began to shake, tossing the girl's body back and forth in the hazy water, deep below the canal's surface. Suddenly, the girl's hands burst free from their constraints and the eel bumped the her on her bottom, giving her some momentum to pull herself up and burst through the surface of the black waters. When the Cat felt the cool of the night air on her face, she ripped off her gag and drew in several great, gasping breaths. She reached inside of her sodden, clinging shift and found her small knife, using it to swiftly cut the ropes from her ankles. As the bindings fell free and drifted down to rest on the bottom of the canal, she heard a small splash behind her and spun her body around in the water, her back now toward the bank of the canal nearest her temple. She saw another of the large eels, it's blind eyes not seeing her but not needing too. It slithered just beneath the calm surface of the water with a speed that was unbelievable for such a large creature, it's mouth open and seeking its meal; her.
Don't panic. Don't let it break your skin, the girl thought. Newly invigorated by the gulps of sweet Braavosi air and the feel of the small, steel blade in her hand, she knew what she must do.
The Cat raised her knife and as the eel neared her, it's large jaw seemed to swing open even wider. The thing seemed to be preparing to clamp onto her shoulder. At the last second, the Cat dropped below the surface, sliding beneath the monstrous eel and jamming her knife upwards towards the thing's trunk, sinking her blade into its great, scaled belly. When she had buried the blade to the hilt, she drug it through the thrashing eel lengthwise, creating a large, ragged slit which began to leak guts and blood into the water around her. The girl then clenched her blade between her teeth and pulled herself with all her strength away from the carnage, using long, even strokes, knowing that within seconds, every eel in the canal would be swarming this area, looking for a meal. As she swam away from the dying eel with speed, she felt many of his brothers, large and small, brushing past her, drawn to the blood. She swam in the direction of the south bay, thinking as she did, I am not your meal. Keep moving.
Her thoughts flickered back and forth as she swam, thinking of how hungry she was, thinking she must swim further to eat, and then thinking, Seven Hells, what are you on about? Just get out of this bloody canal!
When she felt certain she was clear of danger, she swam toward the near side of the canal, grabbing at the long grasses and cat o' nine tails she found there, using them to hoist herself up the muddy bank and onto dry land. She lay on the grassy strip lining the bank for a long time, panting, not thinking of anything except how glad she was that she was not being digested inside of several eels at that precise moment. Her hair splayed out all around her, loose and tangling into into wet ropes, dripping into the grass. She thought she must have lost the leather tie that held her braid together in the canal. After a while, she sat up and began to scrape the canal muck from her feet, only partially succeeding. She reasoned that the barefoot walk back to the temple would remove the rest, only, she wasn't so sure she should return to the temple just then.
What just happened?
Her mind seemed to explode into every direction at once and she willed herself to be still. The girl pulled her legs underneath her, the soaked shift nearly transparent as it stuck to her skin, and sat with her palms flatly pressing the tops of her thighs. She gazed out at the deceptively placid waters of the canal, enveloped by the quiet of the Isle of the Gods and the darkness of the cloudy night. She could not stay there forever, she knew, kneeling on the bank of the canal. She must decide what to do.
What to do very much depends on what that was, she reasoned. It could have been a test, but of what?
The strength of the bonds was such that she could have no hope of slipping them, so it was not a test of that particular skill. The position in which she was bound made any sort of attempt to swim to safety so difficult as to be impossible. Though everyone in the temple knew she always had a knife or three on her person, her arms being bound behind her would make accessing any of them unlikely (and, of course, she had left one of her blades in one of her attackers). So, what? A murder attempt? It certainly felt that way, though it made no sense. Who would want her dead? Or, rather, who would want her dead badly enough that they would be willing to risk the ire of the Kindly Man and her master?
Her master.
She paused, swallowing hard. When she had looked back through the open door of the portal and glimpsed the men in their black and white robes preparing to drop her into the water, she had felt sure she had seen those familiar scratches on the neck of one of her attackers, but now, she wasn't so certain. It had happened very quickly, and the light was certainly poor . She also could not forget that she in an excitable state at the time. Could she have been mistaken? But the pounding in her chest and the knot in her gut told her that she would have to find out for sure. The girl could not accept that Jaqen would harm her but she thought perhaps there might be some other explanation she was missing. She had to speak to him.
The apprentice rose from the grass, brushing futilely at the mud caking her shift where her knees had pressed it through the grass and into the dirt. She walked to the cobblestone lane that ran like a grey ribbon around the isle and followed it home.
The courtyard garden was quiet as the Cat dropped over the wall in a spot that was becoming familiar to her. Her walk back to the temple had partially dried her shift, but it was still very damp and hung heavily, the dirty hem and skirt slapping her legs as she walked. Her hair was still dripping a little, hanging all around her shoulders and sticking wetly to her neck and back. The girl had originally considered bursting through the weirwood and ebony doors of the place, calling angrily for her master to come out and explain himself to her, but she thought the better of it during her walk to the temple and decided to use a stealthier approach.
The bedraggled acolyte flew silently down the dark stone path winding through the garden and let herself in through the back door which led to the kitchen. The place was as quiet as death and she did her best not to disturb the silence, slipping quickly through the corridors and down the stairwell to the second level, where Jaqen's cell was located. She wondered if she would even find him in it. If her adventures had been some sort of order-sanctioned test of her skills, there would likely be a master (possibly hers) awaiting her return in the main temple chamber while the rest of them gathered in the council chambers where, as an acolyte, she was not allowed to enter. But if she found her master in his own chamber, that likely meant he had perpetrated this misdeed of his own volition or else was not involved with it at all. As much as she wanted to believe that was true, that Jaqen had not abducted her from her own bed (well, from under it, anyway), tied her up, and thrown her to a school of monstrous eels, she kept seeing those wounds on his neck and doubt crept in.
You must be wary along your path toward facelessness so that you do not put your trust in the wrong places and your faith in the wrong people.
When the Kindly Man had uttered those words, she had felt that he could not mean her master. To say that Jaqen was the wrong person in which to place her faith had seemed preposterous to her. But that was before she had been shoved through a portal into a murky, eel-infested canal with her hands and feet bound and her mouth gagged.
As the Cat crept up to her master's door, she thought of all the possible explanations he might give her. That she hoped he would give her. The most likely would be that this was a test, ordered by the elders, and that he was there the whole time, confident that she could meet the challenge but prepared to dive in after her if need be. She would still be understandably upset, she decided, but she would see that it was not his fault and that she was never in any real danger. He might also say that it was some trick of her brothers, some ancient initiation ritual of the order, meant to make her realize that she could always count on herself and the skills she had learned here, beneath the roof of the House of Black and White. And, of course, that he was always there, prepared to dive in the whole time and rescue her, if need be. He might even say that he had done it as a punishment for her many transgressions, to teach her that there are consequences when an apprentice flagrantly disobeys the orders of her masters and elders, but that he was there, the whole time, ready to dive in after her if need be.
What she feared, however, was that he would say nothing; that she would walk through his door and into his cell and he would stare back at her with disbelief and then disappointment, aghast that she was still alive. She steeled herself with a deep breath, drawing her lips together in a hard line, and pushed quickly and quietly through her master's door.
His cell had a small window high on the far wall, and though the clouds mostly hid the moon from sight, a small amount of the soft light filtered through the window, allowing her to see the faintest outline of the furniture scattered around the room. Against the far wall, directly under the window, was the bed. The Cat could see the shadowed figure of a sleeping man atop the mattress. She plucked the knife from the small, secret pocket of her shift and gripped it tightly in her left hand, her right hand feeling the air in front of her, in an effort to prevent her from banging into anything that might wake her master. She crept slowly toward the still figure, barely daring to breathe, her skin tingling with apprehension as she neared the sleeping form of the Lorathi. The girl arrived at the bed, the front of her damp shift brushing against the side of the mattress, and meant to lower her dagger to her master's throat and then wake him gently, demanding her answers.
Instead, she found herself roughly yanked down and flipped over in one swift move, her back pressed into the mattress, her instinctively uttered cry muffled by a hand over her mouth. Her master's grip on her wrist forced the knife from her hand in the way he had taught her and the blade fell with a dull thud against the soft blanket. His right hand continued pinning her left wrist to the mattress and her right arm was restrained by his left elbow, his left hand staying firmly clamped over her mouth. The Cat felt Jaqen's warm breath against her cheek, and then she detected his faint whisper as he uttered a phrase that she did not know but thought sounded like it might be in the language of Asshai. A faint hiss emanated from the side of the bed closest to the door before the candle on the small table at her master's bedside come to life, throwing out its warm light into the chamber. Jaqen's face came into focus, hovering inches above her own.
"To what does a man owe such a pleasure?" the assassin asked, his voice still heavy with sleep but his eyes strangely bright. "It is not every day that a beautiful girl comes to his cell to wake him, though the dagger was hardly necessary."
The Cat breathed heavily through her nose but was unable to answer him with his hand firmly covering her mouth. Jaqen's body was tangled in his sheet and blanket but his hard, bare belly was pressed heavily against her own, the damp shift warming between them.
"A girl is wet," he noted, glancing at the clinging shift. "Did you take a bath? It is customary to remove the clothing first, lovely girl. But then, a man knows you have lately struggled with the skills involving the removal of clothes."
His apprentice gave a short, angry snort, signaling her irritation. He narrowed his bronze eyes slightly as he stared into the stormy grey of her own, then set his mouth in a frown and spoke again, his tone no longer suggestive of a jest.
"A man will remove his hand and a girl will speak softly and explain herself, yes?"
She narrowed her eyes in a reflection of his own expression but then gave him a stiff nod. He pulled his hand away from her mouth slightly but kept his apprentice's arms restrained, seemingly not in the mood to chance a tiny fist striking his face. She glared at him, her mind full of anger and confusion and no small amount of fear, and tried to read his face; his eyes. She could find no answer there, so she simply asked what it was that she wanted to know.
"Why did you throw me into the canal, Jaqen?" she said after a moment, sounding bitter.
Her master cocked his head, his white forelock brushing against her ear as he did, tickling her, and she had to suppress the flinch and giggle that rose up in her involuntarily. His face seemed to show genuine confusion, but she did not allow herself to accept it outright, knowing that there was no one more practiced at deceit than a Faceless Man, and there was no one more adept at the art of facelessness than Jaqen H'ghar.
Each stared at the other, waiting. When it became obvious to her mentor that his apprentice did not intend to add more details, he put words to his confusion.
"A man does not understand."
The girl sighed and then returned testily, "It's a simple question, Jaqen. I want to know why you did it."
"What did a man do?" he asked, pushing up further from her so that he could better focus on her face, his hands still pinning hers down, rendering them useless for attacking or defending. She tested her legs for movement but found they were trapped by the weight of his own. She could only move her feet and wiggle her toes, not a very useful thing to have at her disposal at the moment. He frowned at her again and growled his command, "Quit squirming."
She dropped her gaze from his bronze eyes to his neck and saw again the wound there, three healing scratches, parallel marks proving his guilt. She tried to lift her hand to touch the marks, to make her heart believe what her logic was telling her. Her hand remained pinned firmly under Jaqen's iron grip, however, and she was overtaken with such fury that she felt as if it might consume her, turning her to ash even as she remained pressed beneath her master in his own bed. The girl was angry that she was being restrained when she had done nothing wrong. She was angry that she had been thrown (literally) into such a dangerous situation without explanation. She was angry that she was not getting any satisfaction on the matter from her master. She wanted answers. She wanted retribution. She wanted to get up from that damn bed. She had come here to question Jaqen, not to submit to his interrogation. Her helplessness gnawed at her and she became even angrier and more desperate.
Fueled by her intense frustration, a rash plan seized the apprentice's mind and she acted without thought, engaging her instinct instead. You have all the instinct you could ever require. Your task is to learn to heed it. She pushed up from the mattress with her elbows, lifting her shoulders and chest as high as she could. She craned her neck so that she could move her head as close to her master as possible, bringing her lips to his neck. The angry pucker of her mouth softened into a gentle line, her lips parting slightly as she breathed out through them, brushing them against the dried scratches given to her master by the cat; by his Cat. She felt Jaqen go very still and he drew one breath in and held it. The girl closed her eyes, the movement of her lids caressing her mentor with her long lashes, and then she closed her lips over the skin of his neck, trapping a small part of the wounded flesh with her warm mouth, gently clamping his skin and tugging softly at it.
The Cat told herself that she made her next breath convincingly ragged and that it had nothing to do with Jaqen's spicy scent clouding her nostrils, a redolent reminder of his nearness and also who he was. She shook off the heady feeling that threatened to overtake her, lest it rob her of her wits, and opened her mouth just enough to expose the tip of her tongue, which she used to slowly trace the path of the innermost scratch, dragging her moist lower lip along his neck as she did. When she found the end of her reach due to his restraining of her and her mouth had moved as high as it could, she nipped at his flesh, first with her lips and then with her teeth, gently scraping his skin. As she had hoped he would, he loosened his grip on her wrists, flexing his fingers lazily as he pressed her prone forearms gently with his calloused palms. Quick as a snake, the girl snatched her arm from beneath his hand and found her blade, still laying atop the blanket. Her fingers scrabbled, grasping at the dagger desperately. She clutched the hilt firmly in her hand but before she could do any damage with it, her master had wrapped his arms around her in a bear hug, rolling over with her pressed against him, chest to chest, belly to belly, and then threw her off of the bed and onto the unforgiving stone floor.
The girl struck the ground with force and her blade was knocked from her hand, skittering across the stones and almost reaching the door on the far wall. She rolled herself over gingerly onto her back, her elbows and knees abraded and bleeding slightly. After resting a minute, she pushed herself up on her forearms, elbows bent, looking up at her master. Jaqen was now seated on the edge of his bed, his sheet and blanket draped around his middle and tangled between his thighs, the rest of his tanned skin completely uncovered. The girl groaned and allowed herself to drop back down flat onto her back, her troubled eyes staring up at the rafters. She placed her hands over her face and breathed noisily in and out, not knowing what else to do.
"Perhaps a girl should assume a man knows nothing and tell him all," her master suggested, but with a tone that illustrated it was much more of a command than the words themselves might imply.
The Cat sighed into her hands and then sat up, drawing her knees to her chest and wrapping her arms around them, the dampness of her shift chilling her now that she did not have her master's warmth pressing against her. He seemed to take pity on her and pulled his blanket free, keeping the sheet for himself, and tossed her the soft wool covering. She wrapped it around her body gratefully and then gave Jaqen a pitiful look, sick with her confusion and worry.
"Tell a man," he urged, this time more softly.
And so she did. She began the story in her dark cell, explaining how she was having difficulty sleeping and became irritated with the press of the knife and leather strap at her thigh.
"A girl sleeps with a knife at her thigh?" the Lorathi asked incredulously.
She replied, "Well, as it turned out, it was a good thing."
She told him how she had thrown the knife and it had struck a living target, though she couldn't be sure who she had wounded or where she had hit him. She figured the injury was not too grave as it did not seem that any of her attackers was suffering too greatly and she was fairly sure four men entered the room and four men completed their task. At the mention of their task, Jaqen quirked his eyebrow at her.
"I'll get to that," she assured him.
She explained the whole experience of being carried into the lowest levels of the temple and how once she felt the damp air as they descended to the deepest part, she understood what it was that her attackers intended to do with her. As she described being shoved through the door over the canal, her master's grip on the edge of the mattress seemed to tighten. She paused, watching his knuckles turn white but he said nothing, so she continued her tale, reaching the part that had caused her such grief and confusion; the part that had led her to her master's room.
"Once the hood was off," she began, "I was able to look back through the door and I could just make out…"
Her words trailed off and she pulled her lower lip between her teeth, chewing it slowly, her eyes drifting down to the floor and her brow wrinkling as she called up the details of what she had seen, trying to convince herself that what she believed she had witnessed was nothing more than a mistake.
"What was it, lovely girl?" her master's voice gently prodded her.
"I couldn't see any faces, but I could see the neck of the man nearest to the door, standing as close to my eyes as you are now," she told him, and then dropping her voice almost to a whisper and lifting her finger to point toward his neck, added, "and I saw those scratches, Jaqen."
At the girl's words, her master sprang up from his bed with a force that startled his apprentice and the look in his eyes left her feeling very cold, despite the thick blanket draped around her shoulders. The Lorathi looked angry. He looked as angry as she had ever seen him. No, angrier.
The girl leaned away from him, instinctively wary, unsure what his intentions were. For a small moment, she thought he might be angry that she had identified him and meant to… silence her? She wasn't sure, but he just seemed so furious and looked to be bursting to act. Without a word, he turned from her, allowing his sheet to drop away as he snatched up the breeches draped over rail at the foot of his bed, pulling them on swiftly as she averted her eyes in embarrassment.Who sleeps naked? she wondered, coloring as she bit her lip again. She then berated herself for her stupidity. With everything that is going on right now, you think your master's naked arse is something to be concerned with?
After a moment, Jaqen began pacing the length of the room. It was a familiar habit of his, something he did when he wished to think and he wasn't being completely faceless about it. Her eyes tracked him on his repeating path. He was barefoot, unclad but for breeches, his normally groomed hair mussed and slightly tangled. He was muttering.
"A man did not do this thing, but someone wished for it to appear as if he did," he said quietly, his eyes narrowed dangerously, his gaze sweeping along the floor back and forth as if the answer might be found resting on the cool stones. He was speaking more to himself than to his apprentice. "But a girl was hooded. For whose benefit, this ruse? Unless the hood was meant to fall..."
The Cat placed her chin on her knees, her face tilted so that she could watch his pacing, listening for any words he might have that could explain all that befell her that night. She thought to herself that if Jaqen had anything to do with her being tossed into the canal to drown or be eaten (or both), he was doing a fair job of confounding the fact. Her own ogling of him as he paced, practically naked, was doing little to help her own concentration, so she turned her face from him and pressed it against her knees, chewing her lip and willing herself to know the truth.
She thought back to her instinctive reaction when she thought she saw her mentor through the small doorway as she dangled above the canal waters. She had felt hope, even joy. She was relieved, because she knew he would never allow her to come to harm. As it turned out, her relief had been short-lived and her hope misplaced, but it had been her instinctive reaction. The Cat wanted to believe in her master; did believe in her master.
Do you trust a man?
I trust you more than I trust any man alive.
She cleared her mind, no easy task with all that she had learned and endured since Jaqen's return to Braavos, but she did it nonetheless. Her eyes pressed into her knees so hard that she felt in them an aching pain. She exhorted herself to find stillness, looking for the awareness that came with it. And then, she had it. She felt, and she knew.
Arya suddenly had the certainty that her master had not done this thing. She felt it in her bones as she did when a bit of knowledge was undeniable but perhaps not completely explainable. Despite how her eyes had informed her, despite what her logic had told her, despite the Kindly Man's warning to her, she knew the truth. She perceived it, almost able to grasp it physically with her hands, the truth a nearly tangible thing now, so real was it in her mind. Her bones were singing to her, resonating with the conviction of her truth. Once the feeling took hold of her, she understood that Jaqen could not have done this thing because if he had, it would mean that her bones were lying to her and if that were possible, then she would be wrong about other things, too; things that were too important for her to risk being wrong. Jon was not dead. She could feel him in the same place she could feel the truth about Jaqen.
And so she knew.
The Cat lifted her head and saw that her master still paced. He noticed her small movement and it stopped him in his tracks. He gazed down at his apprentice, his hair hanging messily around his face. His eyebrows drew themselves together in a look of concern as he squatted in front of her, meeting her eyes.
"A man did not do this thing," he told her, and the truth of what she already knew was apparent in the burning of his bronze eyes.
"I know," she told him simply, then she hesitated, swallowing before adding, "I… I need to tell you something. I didn't tell you what happened after I fell into the canal… how I escaped."
"A man knows."
This confused her, not understanding what Jaqen thought he knew. He assuredly did not know what it was she intended to say. How could he? She had only just accepted the truth of what she could do herself.
"No… I mean, I have to tell you something… about the eels. And, about the cat… The one in the alley by the armory."
Her master gave her a sad smile and stood up, reaching down for her and pulling her up to standing.
"A man knows," he repeated. "And if he knows, he fears others do as well."
The girl tilted her face toward him, her cheeks now gone pale at his words. She thought back to Westeros; to her girlhood and the tales Old Nan had told the Stark children about giants and white walkers and wargs, ideas that the girl had assumed were created for entertainment and to scare children into complying with their bedtime. She recalled particularly how Old Nan had said that once, wargs were revered for their magic but later, they came to be regarded with suspicion, thought of even as demons, and this led to reprisals by the fearful population. Most of the wargs had eventually been slaughtered and those who survived were driven north of the Wall, according to the legends Old Nan recounted.
"Are you worried that there are some in the order who would… kill me because of what I can do?" she whispered, wondering how it was remotely possible that she could evade the murderous intent of a house full of Faceless Men. She swallowed down the small knot in her throat, the physical manifestation of the despair that was trying to overtake her.
"If only it were that simple," her master remarked, his expression grim as he encircled her with his arms protectively.
The girl had witnessed many embraces in her life. She had seen whores embracing men they hoped to bed for their coin in roadhouses and inns and taverns. She had seen sassy kitchen wenches pulled into the arms of drunken knights as they served in the hall of a great lord, or even at a king's feast. She had seen her own lord father demonstrating his ardor for her lady mother by wrapping his strong arms around the red-haired beauty and holding her tight. The embrace of her master was not like any of these. There was no feeling of affection in it, no lust, no emotional deceit meant to garner some reward. It was not some physical declaration of love or thoughtless, drunken action. The Lorathi did not seek to fulfill his own carnal desire. Jaqen held Arya as if to shield her from whatever sinister force he seemed to see coming for her that she could not herself perceive; to hide her from the world and keep her safe. As he pulled her closer, the blanket fell away from her shoulders and drooped halfway down her back. Her master placed his hand between her shoulders, pulling her closer to him, but felt the dampness of her hair and clothes and remarked upon it.
"A girl is still wet."
"I haven't had time to completely dry yet after my midnight swim," she replied sarcastically.
Normally, he would have snorted his amusement or frowned his disapproval at her tone, but his face remained serious and he released her from his embrace, heading for a trunk at the foot of his bed. Lifting the lid, he began rummaging through it and then pulled out one of his thin, white blouses, offering it to her. When she did not take it, not understanding, he gave a mirthless laugh and told her that he could not make her cleaner after her dance with the eels in the muck on the bottom of the canal, but he could at least make her drier.
"A man will not look," he assured her, as he lifted the shirt to her again. "Besides, he has already seen."
Dropping the blanket to the floor, she growled at him and snatched the shirt from his hand, scampering to a dim corner as Jaqen made a show of turning his back to her. She quickly slipped her filthy shift off and replaced it with the soft, dry blouse, laces at the neck askew. In her state of unease, she dared not fiddle with them, lest she give him even more opportunity to mock her inability to properly manage the fastenings of clothes. The hem of the shirt reached halfway to her knees, draping gently around her form, but she still felt bare. She scrambled to retrieve the sheet her mentor had discarded earlier when he had pulled on his breeches and she wrapped herself in it, covered from neck to toe. The Lorathi turned around and then laughed, accusing her of stealing the one dry coverlet in the room.
"You have soaked a man's blanket and dampened his mattress," he laughed, "and now you deny him his sheet?"
"You can have it back when I leave," she grumbled, starting toward the door to retrieve her dagger from the floor. She did not intend to make the trek back to her cell unarmed.
As she passed the assassin, he grabbed her arm, holding her firmly in place.
"You will go nowhere, lovely girl," he purred softly.
She raised her eyebrows at his serious expression and waited for him to tell her further what she must do before she would be allowed to retire to her own chamber.
"A man cannot protect you a whole floor below, as your battle with the eels of the canal has proven. You will sleep here tonight, and tomorrow… A man will find you a place."
"A man will find me a place?" she repeated, not comprehending.
"An assignment. One that will require you leave the temple, for a time. Until a man has discovered the meaning of this plot."
"You want me to leave the temple?" she clarified, not believing. "But, how will I train? How will I prepare myself for the final trial?"
"There are ways. This thing can be done. But you are not safe here just now, sweet child. A man will speak with the principal elder about this in the morning."
"But Jaqen, if I'm out there, won't I be even more exposed?"
"Exposure is not the worst thing in this case," he told her. "A girl has her wits, and a girl has her skills. You will be safe enough."
The Cat nodded her acceptance of her master's judgment and then tugged herself free of his restraint, heading to the door and retrieving her small dagger. She slipped it the leather strap she still wore on her thigh, just beneath the hem of Jaqen's large blouse. Her master shook his head at her, telling her she did not need to remain armed in his chamber. He would protect her from harm.
"The last time I trusted my master to protect me from harm, he dangled me over a canal and then tried to feed me to the eels," she reminded him. "How can I even know that you're… you?"
The Lorathi approached his apprentice, tilting his head, his bronze eyes boring into her. When he reached where the girl stood, he placed one hand upon her shoulder and the other he pressed flat against her belly, his warmth seeping deep into her.
"What does a girl's gut tell her?" he asked simply.
She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply, detecting cloves and ginger. She exhaled with a sigh and opened her eyes, the storm in them now calm as she replied, "My gut tells me that you are Jaqen H'ghar."
Her master smiled at her and she thought she understood why. She believed him to be pleased that she trusted him; that she understood and accepted his fidelity. He smiled at her gently and she really ascertained nothing; not comprehending that she had named him again and this time, it was without threat; without the shadow of death. This time, it was simply her faith in him that allowed her to claim him; to make him.
My gut tells me that you are Jaqen H'ghar.
He smiled at her gently and whispered, "Just so."