Redemption
Disclaimer: Tamora Pierce owns PotS and I only wish I did.
Days Go By
Kel woke, breathing fast, her eyes shining. Her heart raced; she trembled all over. The dream was not scary; it was exciting. She loved it. She loved that it had all been real.
I want to be like that, she told herself as she always did. I want to protect people. And I will. I'll be a hero one day, just like Mama. Just like the Lioness.
Nobody will kill two kittens in front of me then.
- Tamora Pierce, First Test
Rrrip!
"Ow!" exclaimed Joren. He had barely settled in to his latest 'visit' when the Chamber tore him away and forced him within someone else. It had been a strange sensation, as though he had been 'visiting' an infant or very young child who was being held by its mother or wet nurse. He had felt warm and secure and, oddly enough, loved. It was a wonderful place and Joren wouldn't have minded staying there for a while.
Rrrip!
"Ow!" Joren felt his neck being squeezed tight. Suddenly, it felt as though the ground had dropped out from under his feet - and it had. The person he was 'visiting' now was obviously terrified as a larger someone held him tightly by his shirt collar over the edge of a high tower wall. When the person screamed, and looked down, Joren realized from the clothing that he was "visiting' a little girl. Her heart was pounding very quickly and Joren experienced every moment of her terror as an older lad of perhaps twelve or thirteen held the girl up higher and laughed.
"Conal!" the girl child screamed. "Mama! Papa!" she cried repeatedly, fear making her little voice shaky and frantic. Tears blew away from her eyes as the wind whipped all around her. Joren shared the girl's extreme fright as her skirts flew up into her face and her legs felt cold. Finally, the boy brought the little girl back in over the edge and let go of her collar. She curled up into a tight ball, trembling and crying, as the boy continued to laugh.
"Oh, stop your crying, Kel," said the lad. "It's only a game. Don't be such a baby!"
"Master Conal!" the man-at-arms called up from the ground level, "I hope never to see you do that again, young sir. In fact, I've just informed the Baron of your actions against your little sister. Your father is on his way up there to deal with you now."
Joren heard Conal mutter a curse and then he could only hear and feel the pitiful crying and shuddering of the young girl he now knew to be his enemy, Keladry of Mindelan.
Rrrip!
"Ow!" Joren cried, as he fell on the shiny hardwood floor and felt something heavy fall on top of him. It was the body of a strange-looking woman, with long black hair. An arrow was sticking out of her back. There was a smell of smoke in the air and he heard a lot of yelling nearby.
"Come on, Kel! Hike up those skirts and run!" Yelled a tall, pale-haired woman, with a blade-capped staff in one hand and a pair of gold-sheathed swords in the other.
Joren watched in fascinated horror as the girl ran after the woman and became trapped by large ugly men, who looked and sounded like Scanrans. Joren experienced the shock and awe Kel felt as her mother cut down four of the attackers with her long weapon, which Kel identified in her mind as a glaive. Joren could feel and smell the blood that sprayed Kel and her mother every time the woman defeated an attacker. Joren brooded as he watched through Kel's eyes and saw the Yamani soldiers honor her mother for protecting their sacred artifacts from the Scanran raiders. He had never known the details of this event in Kel's life, and it shamed him to recall that when he was the same age that Kel was here, he had been whining and complaining about his mother not giving him the baby brother he had wanted so much.
Rrrip!
"Ow!" Joren thought again, as a fist connected with the eye of this new person. Then he realized he was still 'visiting' Kel, only she was older and stronger this time. He half expected to see a younger version of himself as her opponent, but it was some other lad - a commoner from the looks of him. He, and a bunch of boys like him, had called Kel 'The Cow' and now they all were brawling on the banks of a stream. After the lads ran off, Joren experienced the horror of Kel facing a spidren and fighting the beast by attacking it with rocks. He felt Kel's anger and helplessness when the monster ate two of the kittens that Kel had been trying to save from the village boys in the first place. Joren grudgingly acknowledged that The Lump had a lot of nerve - and he was beginning to understand why she didn't know her proper place.
Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip!
In quick succession, the Chamber forced Joren to experience Kel's first days at the palace - the humiliating first conference with Lord Wyldon and her parents, the anger being called a probationer, the dismay at seeing her vandalized room, and the controversy over who would be her sponsor. He heard her thoughts about trying to maintain a Yamani-like calm mask in the face of so much turmoil. Joren suspected that the Chamber was trying to get him to empathize with The Lump, but he resisted seeing anything from his enemy's point of view. Joren did not want any more 'visits' with Kel.
Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip!
Next, the Chamber forced Joren to experience, from Kel's point of view, all of the fights that his younger self and Kel had ever had during her first year of training. He also had to relive all of the pranks and ridicule that he and his friends had heaped upon her. Joren marveled that Kel had figured out the weighted lance prank so quickly, but had said nothing to anyone about it. He had always assumed that she was too dim to know that her lance was heavier than everyone else's training lance. Joren even grudgingly acknowledged Kel's jousting skills when, after his younger self had given her a second weighted lance, she figured out how to hit the quintain target perfectly. Also, because of his earlier 'visit' with Kel's four-year-old self, he now understood her fear of heights whenever Lord Wyldon made her climb to high places. Still, Joren stubbornly resisted gaining Kel's perspective on all these events. He did not want to care about her crusades against bullying or elitism, and he did not want to feel the way she felt about her year mates or her horse. He did not want to experience her elation when Lord Wyldon told her she could continue to be a page. Joren did not want to know Kel at all.
Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip!
"Ow!" Joren thought as he experienced the same brawl he went through when he was 'visiting' Owen of Jesslaw, only this time he saw it through Kel's eyes. He was sick of being sent back to 'visit' Kel, and having to live through event after tiring event of his enemy's life. He 'sweated' with Kel as she woke up early and did all of her exercises and practiced with her glaive before breakfast. He felt her exasperation at dealing with her timid maid, Lalasa. Joren truly was horrified when he experienced Kel's bodily adjustments and her first monthlies, too. He wanted to gag when her heart fluttered over her crush on Neal. It annoyed Joren immensely that Kel was so good with her academic studies - especially when he remembered how much he had struggled with math and science. Once again, he grudgingly acknowledged that Kel was skilled in the combat arms as he realized that she was the only page who was thinking clearly during the fight with the hill bandits. How embarrassing it must have been for those male pages! He was glad he had not been there to witness the shame of it. Incredibly, Joren still felt the same way as he had since he met Kel - that she should never have been allowed to train with the lads. Everyone knew that all proper girls belonged at the convent school. Women, the Lioness notwithstanding, should leave the fighting to men.
Rrrip!
Then the Chamber allowed Joren to 'rest' by experiencing one complete day within Kel's perspective, instead of jumping around to so many individual events. It was the day that Kel's lance shattered during tilting practice and Lord Wyldon discovered she had been using weighted training weapons from the start. Joren was just as shocked as the training master had been. That was the same day Kel agreed to let her maid start taking on outside sewing work, and the two of them discussed future plans for a dress shop. Joren thought he'd go crazy from the boredom of having to hear about dressmaking and wages and womanly pursuits. Later that evening Kel had a long conversation with Lord Raoul, who seemed to know all the palace gossip, including Kel's progress as a page, and treated Kel like a regular person. The entire day's events irritated Joren and he was almost glad when he felt the ripping sensation again.
Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip!
Joren wanted to scream his frustration as the Chamber again sent him through several more 'visits' with Kel. Would this torture never end? What was the point of him reliving Kel's life? Why did he have to watch his younger squire self ask for a 'fresh start' at friendship with Kel? Why did he have to experience her confusion when he followed her to the curtain wall and told her she could be a good wife for either Cleon of Kennan or Lord Raoul? Why did he have to see himself through her eyes again and again? Joren was not at all surprised when the Chamber forced him relive the entire day of Kel's big exams - the day his treachery forced her to miss her exams in order to rescue her maid from the top of Balor's Needle. What did surprise Joren was his discovery that, after all the trauma and terror of the rescue, Kel truly was prepared to accept any punishment from Lord Wyldon. She even offered to repeat her page years. Joren heard her thoughts and felt her submission to the rules. This girl was unbelievably humble and noble! Joren resented her all the more, but now he agreed with Lord Wyldon - everything would have been so much better for everyone if only Keladry had been born a boy.
Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip! Rrrip!
If it had been physically possible, Joren would have strangled the Chamber. His senses felt raw from what seemed to be a hundred more fast-paced 'visits' with Kel. Joren was overwhelmed by the feelings the Chamber forced him to feel: Joy when Lord Raoul chose Kel to be his squire ... Agony when the renegade centaur attacked her ... Dismay when she realized she would have to care for the baby griffin she rescued ... Irritation when Lerant's jealousy became obvious ... Anxiety when she realized part of her training included tilting with Lord Raoul ... Amusement when the ladies at the bath house assumed her training bruises came from an abusive relationship ... Happiness when she discovered that the Yamani ladies were old friends from her childhood ... Rage at the process and outcome of Joren's trial for kidnapping Lalasa ... Righteous indignation when she confronted the King about the injustice of the law ... Satisfaction when she was able to get Prince Roald and Princess Shinkokami to relax and enjoy being together ... Terror when she pressed her hands to the Chamber door and it gave her horrible visions ... Giddiness when her romance with Cleon blossomed ... Determination when she started jousting during the King's Progress ... Sadness when the griffin's parents took him away ... Dread when she prepared to joust Lord Wyldon ... Guilt when she realized Vinson must have committed his horrible crimes after she did not report his attack on Lalasa ...
Rrrip!
Joren's eyes were fixed on the horizon as he sat atop his favorite hill, but the beautiful view would not calm him the way it usually did. His thoughts were a whirlwind of confusing images, painful memories and terrifying thoughts. Joren despised the Chamber more than ever for the 'learning experiences' it had just forced him to go through. He felt confused and jumbled up - fragmented - and he hated those feelings as much as he hated the Chamber.
"You're still in one piece after all of that, I assure you, and your feelings toward me do not matter," drawled the Chamber/Joren, as though it had read his thoughts. "Tell me, what did you learn?"
"I learned that you are the most vicious and cruel being in all of existence to have forced me into reliving the life of my enemy. I don't care that she's so noble - fighting for her fellow pages and teaching her maid self-defense. I don't care that she's so ... so caring - saving everything from kittens to an ill-tempered horse to a baby griffin. And I truly don't care - and really didn't want to know - about her life as a female. Thank the gods I'll never have to deal with breast-bands and monthlies and crushes. Mithros! That was the worst thing I've ever experienced. How many more 'visits' do I have to make?"
"The longer it takes you to understand, the more 'visits' you will have," stated the Chamber/Joren.
"You can't make me like her, no matter how many 'visits' you force upon me. Why does it matter if I hate the person who messed up everything for me? "
"Your hatred is much of the reason you are still here with me. It is amazing that you are still so filled with hate."
"Ha! I think you must really hate me. How much more of this ... this ... torture do you expect me to endure?"
"I am the Chamber of the Ordeal. I have no mortal feelings. Everything you see in me is merely a manifestation of what you have seen in yourself. If it's hatred you see on this face, then you must realize that it is only a mirror of your own face. "
"So then, is this my punishment - my 'slow and unbearable' choice of a death? If I have to do this for all of eternity, just kill me now and send me to the the Dark God. I don't care if you pity my soul forever."
"Be careful what you wish for," advised the Chamber/Joren. "Perhaps this will be your 'punishment' as you say. Perhaps your next 'visit' will help you understand everything more clearly. We shall see."
A/N: Sorry this is so long, but I hope you liked the way I presented this chapter. There was just so much 'history' to cover and I'm really trying to move the story along to something different, but it needs this background layer. Please let me know how it came across to you. Thanks!