Graceling (Graceling Realm #1)(65)

Stop it. “And you’re a fool.”

“Come out of there, wildcat. We’ve enough fish.”

She waded to shore. Meeting her at the edge of the water, he pulled her up onto the moss. Together they gathered up the fish and walked to the fire.

“I tire,” Katsa said. “And I feel cold and hunger.”

“All right, if you say so. But just compare yourself to other people.”

Compare herself to other people.

She sat down and dried her feet.

“Shall we fight tonight?” he asked.

She nodded, absently.

He set the fish above the flames and hummed and washed his hands, and flashed his light at her from across the fire.

She sat – and thought to herself about what she found when she compared herself to other people.

She did feel cold, sometimes. But she didn’t suffer from it as other people did. And she felt hunger sometimes; but she could go long with little food, and hunger did not make her weak. She couldn’t remember ever feeling weak, exactly, for any reason. Nor could she remember ever having been ill. She thought back and was certain. She’d never even had a cough.

She stared into the fire. They were a bit unusual, these things. She could see that. And she knew there was more.

She fought and rode and ran and tumbled, but her skin rarely bruised or broke. She’d never broken a bone. And she didn’t suffer from pain the way other people did. Even when Po hit her very hard, the pain was easily manageable. If she was being honest, she’d have to admit that she didn’t quite understand what other people meant when they complained of pain.

She didn’t tire as other people did. She didn’t need much sleep. Most nights she made herself sleep, only because she knew she should.

“Po?”

He looked up from the fire.

“Can you tell yourself to go to sleep?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, can you lie down and make yourself fall asleep? Whenever you want, instantly?”

He squinted at her. “No. I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“Hmm.”

He studied her for a moment longer, and then seemed to decide to let her be. She barely noticed him. It had never occurred to her before that the control she had over her sleep might be unusual. And it wasn’t just that she could command herself to sleep. She could command herself to sleep for a specific amount of time. And whenever she woke, she always knew exactly what time it was. At every moment of the day, in fact, she always knew the time.

Just as she always knew exactly where she was and what direction she was facing.

“Which way is north?” she asked Po.

He looked up again and considered the light. He pointed in a direction that was loosely north, but not exactly. How did she know that with such certainty?

She never got lost. She never had trouble building a fire, or shelter. She hunted so easily. Her vision and her hearing were better than those of anyone she’d ever known.

She stood abruptly. She strode the few steps back to the pond and stared into it without seeing it.

The physical needs that limited other people did not limit her. The things from which other people suffered did not touch her. She knew instinctively how to live and thrive in the wilderness.

And she could kill anyone. At the slightest threat to her survival.

Katsa sat on the ground suddenly.

Could her Grace be survival?

The instant she asked it, she denied it. She was just a killer, had always been just a killer. She’d killed a cousin, in plain view of Randa’s court – a man who wouldn’t have hurt her, not really. She’d murdered him, without a thought, without hesitation – just as she’d very nearly murdered her uncle.

But she hadn’t murdered her uncle. She’d found a way to avoid it and stay alive.

And she hadn’t meant for that cousin to die. She’d been a child, her Grace unformed. She hadn’t lashed out to kill him; she’d only lashed out to protect herself, to protect herself from his touch. She’d forgotten this, somewhere along the line, when the people of the court had begun to shy away from her and Randa had begun to use her skill for his own purposes, and call her his child killer.

Her Grace was not killing. Her Grace was survival.

She laughed then. For it was almost like saying her Grace was life; and of course, that was ridiculous.

She stood again and turned back to the fire. Po watched her approach. He didn’t ask what she was thinking, he didn’t intrude; he would wait until she wanted to tell him. She looked at him measuring her from across the flames. He was plainly curious.

“I’ve been comparing myself to other people,” she said.

“I see,” he said, cautiously.

She peeled back the skin of one of the roasting fish and sliced off a piece. She chewed on it and thought.

“Po.”

He looked up at her.

“If you learned that my Grace wasn’t killing,” she said, “but survival…”

He raised his eyebrows.

“Would it surprise you?”

He pursed his lips. “No. It makes much more sense to me.”

“But – it’s like saying my Grace is life.”

“Yes.”

“It’s absurd.”

“Is it? I don’t think so. And it’s not just your own life,” he said. “You’ve saved many lives with your Grace.”