Read Online The Enlightened by Dima Zales - Free Book Online Page B

Joining. Nothing about Mimir’s message, but I highlight my inability to glean information from the Enlightened minds.
    “They’re tough bastards.” He smirks.
    “So what do you get out of working for them?”
    “Time,” he says. “They let me spend crazy amounts of time in their Mind Dimensions. That, and well, they’re the highest authority Readers have.”
    I suspect it’s more the former than the latter, but I hold my tongue. “Speaking of payment,” I say instead. “Now that you know what’s going on and about the Joining, why don’t you teach me what you promised? A deal’s a deal.”
    “I will, but first tell me why you had those thoughts. Why did you think you were a Pusher?” He gives me a hard look. “I mean, if you’re their son’s kid.”
    “You said you only wanted to know what happened here,” I say. “And I got a very strong impression this was something the grandparents didn’t want you to know.”
    “I won’t kill you, if that’s what you’re worried—“
    “Why don’t you ask Paul?” I figure I might need another favor from Caleb some day, and if he doesn’t figure it out by then, I can trade this info for it. Then again, if we’re about to fight, do I really want to antagonize him?
    “Maybe I will,” he says and stands in a semi-familiar stance. “A deal’s a deal. I’ll hold my punches, but you don’t have to.” As he says this, he punches me in the shoulder, lightning-fast. He definitely isn’t using his full strength, but it still hurts when his fist connects with my body. “You were about to block that with your right elbow, but walking out of it would’ve been more effective,” he instructs.
    He throws more punches and gives me feedback on my responses to them. He claims I’m getting the hang of it, and maybe I am, but if I ever needed to fight Caleb for real, I’d still be pretty hopeless. I rarely manage to block his punches and land few of my own.
    “You ready for the shooting part?” he asks after I’m barely moving from fatigue. We’ve been practicing hand-to-hand combat for what feels like a number of hours. “I’ll give you some more combat tips after. It’s good to take a break now and then.”
    Pushing aside my exhaustion, I follow him and help carry the guns and ammo from his room and out of the Temple, as Caleb insists on shooting in the forest.
    “You see that frozen-in-time bird?” He points to a hawk in the far distance. “I want you to hit it.”
    I point the gun, a revolver he handed to me, and take careful aim.
    Then I take the shot. The bird remains untouched.
    “Don’t feel bad for the bird,” he teases. “You won’t really kill it.”
    “Being an asshole wasn’t part of the deal,” I tell him. Truth be told, I’ve always had an aversion to hunting. His reminder thatno animals will be harmed actually does help.
    “You have to pull the trigger on your exhale,” he says. “Place the front sight blade on the target, and then place the front blade in between the valley back sights.”
    “Next you’ll be telling me to pull the trigger,” I say, but do as he instructed. The exhale thing must’ve helped, because the bird falls to the ground.
    “Now try shooting that squirrel,” he says, and then spends a few minutes explaining how to spot my new target between all the branches.
    Many bullets and forest creatures later, I tire of the lessons. My shooting has improved, but of course it would, after so many subjective hours of practice.
    A different problem becomes apparent now: patience is not my virtue. There’s only so much shooting and fighting I can do before going crazy. My plan to kill time until Paul runs out of Depth has been revealed as the pleasant delusion it was. No matter how much of his Depth is depleted, Paul still has plenty left to outwait me in my worried-about-Mom state.
    “All right,” I say after the last shot. “I’m ready to head back.”
    “Why don’t you run and try shooting a few things