It was a darkness lit only by stars which covered the desert hills that night. Lilith stood at the top of one with her back to the caravan below. She stared off into the distance of the northwest. As Xenith climbed up to join her, she wasn't sure if her Adept was looking at the landscape or at the stars.

"Adept," she asked softly, "shouldn't we be guarding the caravan?"

Lilith lost some of the remote look in her eyes as she turned around and pointed her right hand at the encampment. Life-light flared and Xenith saw that there was a network of fine life-cords stretching from Lilith down towards the encampment. As she looked at the energy surge, she was suddenly dazzled by a splitting and re-splitting which covered the entire area in a network of lines. "I've got it covered, apprentice" was the reply. With that, Lilith turned back to regard the distance.

Xenith did, too, but after a couple of minutes she had to ask, "what are you looking at, adept? I don't see anything."

This time, Lilith pointed in the direction she was looking, and Xenith, following that line, saw a fountain of life-fire in the distance. As she stared at it, she realized with a chill that it was in the far distance, but she could still make it out. It must be huge at the site, whatever was producing it. "How far away is that? It looks almost like a hundred miles or so."

"Probably more like fifteen hundred, " was the quiet response. "I've never tried to measure it accurately."

Xenith's jaw dropped. "What is that??" she asked, quietness forgotten.

Lilith continued to stare into the distance, but after a while, she began to talk in a musing tone. "What is it? One object, but it is so many things... a teacher that showed me much of what I know that no one else does... the bringer of death to thousands which I once wielded... a warning marker against a trouble which no one else in the Heartland knows about... an ancient spirit which still haunts this world... sometimes it seemed like an idiot savant magic researcher, too. In the end, though, it proved to be a waypoint back to sanity and civilization- and a treasured friend even with all the painful memories it represents." She sighed, and was once again lost in her own thoughts.

Xenith shivered, and it wasn't from the cold. She suddenly realized that Lilith might be hard, but that she had also gone through many more things than Xenith had- and probably suffered more, too. Or at least, she amended, more in an absolute sense, maybe. I can't imagine anyone going through what I did and still coming out like her. The darkness waited patiently as adept and apprentice stared at the distant fire, both remembering things past.

"Adept, what was it like to kill... thousands?" Xenith finally asked in the subdued voice that the quietness around them seemed to demand.

"A relief, at first... I lived with their hatred in my mind so long that my sanity was being threatened- or at least it felt that way. I was so glad to feel that pressure gone that I went out into the desert feeling like I was floating. Free as a bird, I thought. I was so glad it was all over. And then... right out in the middle of the desert, those feelings sort of faded, and... it was ashes, vixen. Nothing but dirt fouling me. I can't say I was sorry for doing it- I never was. But you can never kill someone without it killing a part of you. I'd felt that hollowness before- thought I knew all about it. I didn't. Bad enough when you're with a group sharing a common goal and that emptiness threatens to swallow you. But to be alone... to be by yourself, for reasons no one else really understood... there's nothing left then."

Xenith let Lilith's words fade in the air. She didn't want to know more- somehow, she felt like she was treading on territory that could kill you if you made a wrong step. Well, not physically kill you, she amended to herself. But to walk with death until you don't even know where life is anymore??

"This desert became a part of me after that... I guess you could say we suited each other. Both barren, both deadly... both not really seeking anyone or anything else, just sort of existing. I've seen it from the northern wastes to the southern grasslands... seen it flower after rains... seen it dying and dead many times. It always had something more to show. But it never was more in itself. It continued. I continued. Not much of a reason for either, I suppose... just the way things were."

"I know, " Xenith replied softly. "Sometimes it's just a matter of breathing. Nothing else to do or be."

Xenith's understanding words seem to pull Lilith back from her reverie. She grinned a very slight bit as she said, "don't you want to know why I came back?"

Xenith looked puzzled for a bit, then mused "I guess I just thought you finally got over the pain. Maybe... reconciled yourself with what you did? Or understood it?"

Lilith shook her head firmly. "No. My friend, " she nodded towards the horizon, "showed me that I'd simply discovered the empty canvas of existence. The.... foundation, if you will. Things had happened as they had, had done what they were going to do, but I had to pick up the pieces and start putting it together again. It was rather peaceful out here, actually, after the first ache faded. But after a while, my mind sort of opened again, and I realized that I wasn't just a meaningless cog- but that I had to make my own meaning and character. In the end, it might not matter- but for now, it mattered to me."

"Hmmm... so your life's purpose is to live it so that you like it?"

"Not necessarily. No, what I mean is that ultimately you are responsible for what you do with your life, and that what you see of this universe is what you are accountable for. Who knows. Maybe there is more out there. I know that there is an up and down in things like moral affairs, just like there is in gravity. But what, where, why... I've only got bits and pieces. It's those things that have to concern me, not the fact that things exist in general. That just is."

"Sooo... you are accountable for all those furs you killed?"

"Oh yes- but it's not like I have to pay it back. That I know of. It's just that that thing became a part of me. Made me who and what I am. It's in my raw material now. I was molding at the time, but that's past. Now all I can do is work with what's been set before me." Lilith grinned and reached out to clasp Xenith by the arm. "But come, enough philosophy, it's time to show you something of all this." She waved her hand around and Xenith saw the sparks of life energy fly through the environment.

A couple of minutes later they were walking back to camp, and Xenith was making a confession. "My main problem seems to be I get overwhelmed. It's so easy to get lost in all the complexity of the life webs. Why, I could stare all day just at that clump of brush, and still not understand it all. How can you manipulate anything when you don't know what it is?"

Lilith laughed. "You are so right. It's the very first step to actually being effective. The dirty little secret is that virtually no one understands everything about what they're doing."

"They don't??"

"No. You have to be able to cut through the complexity to see only the parts you need to know. That's the first skill you need to learn. Oh, don't look at me that way, it's not hard. It's sort of built in, actually. Look, tell me what this is." She reached down and picked up a rock.

"Uhh... it's a rock. So?"

"So you just demonstrated what I meant. You didn't tell me size, color, what's in it, what it might do if you applied heat or cold, or a hammer- or applied it to someone else's skull. You didn't tell me its history, or where it's creation was. You don't know a lot of that- but more important, what you do know you take for granted. It's in our nature to simplify things, otherwise we never could do anything in the way of thought, period. How could you even walk down a beach if you had to understand every pebble before you trusted yourself to step on it? No, what we do is mentally construct a simplified view- and it works most of the time. When it doesn't, we have to modify it- if we can. Or if we want to."

"Want to?? But why wouldn't you?"

"Why? Sometimes it's just too much to admit that you were wrong about something. Sometimes, " she added in a slower tone, "it's even worse to admit that the way you thought things were just didn't match with reality. Some furs think that means that nothing they've done means anything."

"Oh." Xenith was feeling a little full emotionally. Too much information coming too fast--- what a funny way to feel, considering what I'm being told. Is there any way of understanding things that is simple?

"Yes- oh. but that's beside the main point, which is based on the simple fact that when you direct your attention to a life cord or net, that attention concentrates your energy- and attracts the energy in the system- to highlight what you're looking at. Now, when you add that fact to your partly subconscious process of discarding non-essentials, you find that by looking at something and mentally focusing on what you want to see, it automatically becomes clearer."

"Oh!! But you'd still have to know what to look for."

"So true. That's where experience and tutors come in. It's also why no one is totally sure what can and can't be done with life-energy. There are so many possibilities and complications that no one knows them all- or can. All we know is what works easiest- but sometimes, what works easiest might be based on what we expect to work, and not what is truly the least complicated."

"Hmmm... so are preconceptions good or bad?"

Lilith grinned. "Among magicians, there is a saying- the difference between an apprentice and an adept is being able to see what you want to see, and the difference between an adept and a master is seeing what you don't want to see. It works both ways. First, you have to be able to simplify what you're looking at to do anything. But after you do know how to do some things, you might find yourself needing to unlearn or relearn more complex things, or simply just different things, in order to learn more."

Xenith pondered what she was hearing. "I guess I'm definitely in the learn what I want to see stage, then."

Lilith nodded. "Most definitely. So let's get you started on doing some applications....."

They began to walk around the camp as Lilith showed Xenith how to spot different life nets at a distance. Before too long, Xenith was able to see anything bigger than a mouse that was closer than half a mile or so. They both had some laughs over what they could see happening- not a few of those laughs coming from what happened in the caravan they were guarding.

"What happens if you sense the flow of energy in someone instead of in a rock, anyway? I mean, you know what the rock feels like when you twist your awareness into it, but what about a person?"

Xenith's chin was jerked around until she was facing Lilith. "Apprentice, what did I tell you about looking me in the eye when you asked something??"

"Oops, " Xenith blushed. "I forgot. I'm sorry, Adept."

Lilith held eye contact for a few seconds, then smiled very slightly as she said, "don't be. I'm not that upset about it- not nearly as much as I would have been a few days ago. If you're looking at something else when you ask, it's better than looking at the ground."

"Why?"

"I'll let you solve that answer for yourself. Now, it's time for you to get some sleep."

As they walked back to their campfire, Xenith realized that her first question had never been answered. She thought of asking it again, then thought better. There was probably something there she wasn't supposed to know yet. Maybe someday. She bedded down while the dark shape of Lilith stood facing outwards above her. As she drifted off, she puzzled over Lilith's meaning about not looking at the ground, but after a bit she thought back to her earlier conversation when Lilith told about her past. I wonder, she thought as she drifted off into sleep, which is worse, anyway? Being the victim of violence, or committing it and then living with yourself afterwards?