Taniwha's Tear Read Free Page B

when I wish them away.’
    ‘Do you know who it is?’
    He shook his head. ‘No. I’ve no idea.’ He looked her in the eye. ‘Do you know who it could be?’
    Pania shrugged lightly. ‘It could be anyone. Well, out of a very small pool of people. Not many people can do it.’
    ‘How many?’
    The girl frowned. ‘I’ve been told that there are maybe fifty of you humans in this country that can do some form of useful magic. Perhaps another few hundred who have a little potential but will never amount to much. Since you and Wiri killed Puarata, there are lots of people who are curious about you. But most folk have bigger problems since that happened.’
    ‘But Puarata dying was good, right? It made things better?’
    Pania nodded. ‘Yes, of course.’ She looked down. ‘Except that it also triggered a war.’
    Mat stared. ‘Huh?’ He glanced around, looking for evidence of conflict.
    ‘Not here! In Aotearoa. Think about it, Mat; when someone that powerful dies unexpectedly, it creates an opportunity. All manner of folk try to step into the shoes of the fallen leader. That’s the way it has always been. Don’t they teach you history at school?’
    ‘Yeah, but…that’s all, um, historical, you know…’ he concluded lamely.
    Pania rolled her eyes and sat down cross-legged on the shingle beach. She could have been fourteen or four hundred, her face full of secrets. Mat sat facing her. ‘They’re going to get someone to teach you, you know,’ she said. ‘Someone who can show you the things you need to know. Hakawau says that you’re probably the most gifted young tohunga ruanuku in Aotearoa. He said even he was stunned with some of the things you did, when you escaped Puarata.’
    Mat blushed proudly. ‘He did?’ After the breakthroughs he had made during his flight to Cape Reinga, he’d left every thing alone for a while. But a few weeks after getting home he’d met Pania again while running on the beach one evening, and she had agreed to teach him a little—for his own good, she told him. That was two months ago, and they were making considerable progress, despite having to meet in secrecy because he’d promised Wiri he’d not touch his new powers until a tutor could be found. ‘Wiri told me about this guy, Jones, who’s coming here soon,’ he added.
    Pania nodded. ‘A good man, they say. I’m glad. I do not have sufficient knowledge to take your learnings much further.’
    ‘But you’ve been great!’ Mat exclaimed. They had spent hours together, on frustrating little exercises that had finally begun to click in his head in the last few weeks. ‘Thanks to you, I know how to light fires, and repair seams, and lots of other stuff. You’re a great teacher.’ And I really like you, he didn’t add.
    She shook her head. ‘You already know nearly as much as I do about it now,’ she said lightly. ‘You need a proper teacher, to keep you safe.’
    He felt a sudden chill, and a breeze from the land carried an unpleasant carrion smell. ‘What do you mean, “to keep me safe”?’
    ‘To keep you safe from other “magicians” who want to make a name for themselves,’ Pania explained. ‘Most are weak but some are very strong. The strongest are like Puarata, very dangerous indeed. And most of them are filthy little sneaks,’ she added venomously.
    Mat looked at her queasily. ‘Serious?’
    ‘Of course. Do you think people are so intrinsically virtuous that they won’t use a secret power for their own gain? They all use their powers to cheat, and then to hurt, and it taints them. It changes them. There are only a handful of ruanuku that I would trust, out of the dozens I’ve met.’
    Mat felt his skin go cold. It felt like she’d just told him he had a congenital illness. ‘But I won’t be like that,’ he insisted.
    ‘You better not,’ she replied severely. ‘Anyway, now that Puarata is dead, all those with evil in their hearts are coming out of the shadows, trying to lay claim to