Wavesong

by Isobelle Carmody

  “All that she told you is true,” I said. “But there are few of us, and it will take time to establish real control, even with the help of the shadows. We must proceed with care, for the moment your brothers realize we are in their midst, they will put on their demon bands and we will be helpless.”

  “If you control the Threes and the One, you are far from helpless,” said the youth. He glanced at Cinda, then back to me. “She said you need information about Ariel, but you need not trouble yourself about the Pale Man, for he has gone to Norseland. It is said that he will go to the west coast before he returns.”

  His last words gave me pause, but realizing Cinda had told him nothing of the plague null, I did so, explaining that I needed to know where he might have taken the null. “Faugh!” the lad spat. “It does not surprise me that the Pale Man should come up with such a foul plan. All novices fear him, because when first we come, he tests us to see if we would suit being made into nulls. He smiles when we scream, as if our suffering pleasures him. I know nothing of this matter of the west coast, but I can question the other novices at midmeal. It is unlikely anyone knows more, for the Pale Man’s chambers are in a sector on the other side of the compound where few of us have call to go.”

  “How many sectors are there?” I asked.

  “Twenty-one,” he answered. “The only reason novices leave their sectors is because a Herder bids them go, and you must go only where you are told and then return directly. Sometimes my master sends me to the ink house or paper press, but occasionally I accompany him to the library, which is right across the compound.”

  “Is movement controlled?” I asked.

  He nodded gravely. “Any unaccompanied novice or acolyte outside his sector must produce his master’s token to show he has been sent on an errand, and the token is marked with chalk to tell where he is meant to go. If he is in the wrong place, a whipping or time in the tide cells would be the least he would suffer.” He glanced again both ways along the lane.

  I nodded and thanked him. “If you can find out anything that might help us understand more about Ariel’s plans on the west coast, even an overheard phrase or gossip, it may mean the difference between saving the west coast and not,” I said. “But you must not let anyone guess why you are asking.”

  “I will be careful,” he said. “But you should know that I am not the only novice who would be glad to be free of this robe and this place. There are three I know who would gladly fight if it comes to that. There are more in other sectors, but it is better for us not to know one another in case one is questioned. Yet if there is real hope of getting free of the Faction, then maybe it is time for us to know one another. Where do I find you if I learn something?” he asked.

  “Seek out Cinda, and she will bring you to us,” I said after the slightest hesitation. It struck me that I did not know his name. I asked him, but before he could respond, the door behind him opened, and an older Herder stepped out. “Novice, why are you taking…?” He stopped, his eyes widening at the sight of Cinda and me. Before he could even begin to formulate a suspicion, I entered his mind and made him come outside and close the door behind him. I felt Cinda and the young novice watching me as I coerced the priest. The novice gaped openly when his master turned, blank-faced, and went back inside, closing the door quietly behind him.

  “Right now he thinks he has just told you to hurry up. He won’t remember seeing us at all, but later this afternoon he is going to become terribly sleepy and lie down until nightmeal. Before he sleeps, he will give you a token with his mark. You need only speak Cinda’s name into his ear and say whatever you wish him to scribe, and he will do it. Now go back in, and be careful,” I warned him.

  The novice squared his shoulders, and his eyes flashed. “You asked my name, lady? It is Elkar, and you may count on me.”

  When we returned to the One’s chamber, I was disappointed to find that there was still no word of Helvar, but the compound map was beginning to take shape, complete with shadow paths, sectors, and even details about buildings. Harwood was fascinated to hear about Elkar and as eager as I to see what the lad might unearth. He invited me to look at the map, and I knelt down to study it.

  I ran my eyes along the shadow path I had taken with Cinda. From what I could tell, the building Elkar had come from was marked “Scrips.” I guessed it must have something to do with scribing since he had mentioned an ink house and a paper press. I searched until I found the library he had mentioned. As he had said, it was on the other side of the compound. Harwood was now explaining that although most sectors were virtually self-sufficient, each had at least one activity that served the entire compound.

  “These communal activities seem to be the key to moving safely around the compound,” Harwood said. “For instance, here is the food store for the entire compound. Shadows and novices from here make deliveries to kitchens all over the compound, including to the Hedra and the inner-cadre walled garden.”

  Cinda touched my arm and said that we ought to poison the food meant for the Hedra sector, for we could kill all of them at one stroke. I exchanged a startled look with Harwood, who told her gently that we intended to take control with as little killing as possible.

  “Why?” she asked, looking confounded. “Better to kill as many priests as possible, so they can never harm anyone again.”

  I hid my shock and said mildly that poisoning them would have all sorts of repercussions we could not possibly cope with, such as hundreds of dead bodies that would need disposing of before they rotted. I had thought to bring home to her the grisly reality of her suggestion, but she merely shrugged and said the bodies could be piled up in the exercise yards and burned.

  Harwood began asking Cinda about the routines within the compound, but I was puzzled. If Cinda and the other shadows were so willing to see their masters die, why had they not rebelled already?

  I turned my attention back to the map, noting the repetition of sleeping halls, meal chambers, and cloister in each sector. I also spotted an unmarked area at the compound’s end, farthest from the gate. Before I could ask what it was, Cinda rose and touched my arm, explaining that she and one of the others must go to fetch the One’s nightmeal, for it was always made ready at this time.

  “Ye gods,” Harwood muttered after she had gone. “I thought when she said the shadows would be willing to fight tooth and nail it was romantic rhetoric, but if the rest think as Cinda does…”

  “They can’t, or they would have rebelled before now,” I said. I drew his attention back to the map and asked if he knew yet of Ariel’s chambers.

  He pointed to a small section alongside the library, explaining that they were contained within the wall surrounding the library. Then he tapped another largish section. “That is what interests me. It is the healing center, and it serves the whole compound, according to the shadows who go there to collect medications for the One. I have not scribed it yet, but the whole sector is one immense labyrinthine building with three levels above the ground and two below. Instead of having meal halls kept separate from the healing facility, the acolytes, novices, and shadows live in chambers on one of the subterranean levels while the ranked priests live on the topmost level. I suppose this is because healers have to be available constantly. They are trained within the building and rarely leave it save to go to daily prayer meetings in a nearby sector, because the healing center lacks a cloister.”

  I touched the place on the map where the Hedra sector ran up against the healing center. “Do priests from the healing center attend the Hedra cloister?”

  “No, but the healing center is one level higher than any other building in the compound and two levels higher than most. And it overlooks the Hedra training grounds. One watcher up there—”

  “But we already have Hilder and Tomrick on the outer wall.”

  “They are too far away, and they would have to divide their attention,” Harwood said. “If we put even one watcher on top of the healing center, they could watch th
e whole central area of the compound, including the Hedra sector, and could serve as a conduit for farsought information.”

  I nodded. “Then do it.”

  “I was also thinking that the healing building would make the perfect command center,” added Harwood. I have just sent Sover there with some of the shadows, supposedly to get something to ease the One. Sover will remain there and begin coercing healers at once. I have sent Colwyn over to take a look at this sector.” He pointed to a small area that ran up against the outer wall of the compound behind the Hedra sector. “This is the compound armory. It is walled, and the only way to enter it is from the Hedra training ground. Apparently, it is guarded constantly, but we need to get control of it, given that it may contain the Beforetime weapon you mentioned.”

  I shuddered; then something struck me. “If you sent Sover to the healing center, who is watching over the One?”

  Harwood said dismissively, “Some of the shadows. Geratty is sleeping in the dressing room, and they will wake him if the One stirs.” He pointed to the large area I had noticed at the end of the compound, naming it tainted ground.

  “Tainted ground?” I echoed.

  “Strictly speaking, it sounds as if it is more a patch of blacklands centered on a tainted pool,” Harwood said. “The whole area is walled and encompasses the mine where the male shadows work. There are sleeping quarters and an eating hall for the shadows who work there. They never come out, apparently. Lure told me that some of her sisters take in food once a day. I think we need control of it, because aside from the armory, it is the only other place where the priests will be able to get demon bands.”

  “What of the bands taken from us at the gate?”

  “They are returned to the armory,” Harwood said.

  I pointed to Ariel’s chambers again and asked Harwood what he had learned of them.

  “Not much,” Harwood said, frowning at the map. “The shadows do not go there, any more than novices or acolytes. Apparently, Ariel uses nulls to attend him. I probed Mendi and Grisyl to see what they knew and found they have never been in Ariel’s chambers. Moreover, they were remarkably incurious about what goes on there, despite their doubts about Ariel. That lack of curiosity made me dig into Mendi’s mind until I found the coercive structures Ariel had set up to ensure that no one interferes with him. It is the same with Grisyl.”

  “I wonder what is of such importance there that Ariel would keep everyone away,” I said.

  “Maybe plague seeds,” said Harwood. “I would like to do a little more nosing around before you try searching there.”

  “All right,” I said reluctantly. “I will wait until the shipfolk begin work on the Stormdancer. But no longer, for there may be information there that will help us find the null quickly.”

  Cinda returned, accompanied by a beaming Ode who carried a great black cauldron of stew and a basket of bread and boasted of having coerced every person in the sector seven kitchen. Harwood bade Cinda give the One’s tray to Falc and sent him to see if he could wake his master to eat. Then he woke Reuvan and Geratty, and we all ate sitting cross-legged on the floor, the shadows among us, as Harwood outlined his plan to take over the healing center and capture the armory. We had barely begun when Elkar appeared at the dressing-room door.

  “I did not realize you would be here,” he said. “You said to seek out Cinda if I had something to tell.”

  “You know of the secret stairs to the One’s chamber?” I asked.

  He glanced at Cinda. “I usually wait for Cinda or one of the shadows on the stairs, but I heard your voice.” He was looking about at the others with open curiosity, and I explained who he was and let them offer their own names. Then I said, “Have you learned anything about Ariel?”

  “One of the novices in the dining hall told me of another novice who had talked of seeing the Pale Man and his special nulls, but he could not recall who it was. He has promised to try to remember.”

  “The Pale Man?” Harwood echoed.

  “Ariel,” I said, and nodded for Elkar to continue.

  “Mainly I came to tell you that the other novices are willing to help.” He gave a sudden laugh. “Willing! Say rather they are demanding to help. You cannot imagine how the idea of freedom fired them. Even I could not have predicted the strength of their reaction. In truth, none of us guessed there was anything to escape to, for it seemed that the Herders were the masters of the world. But then the invasion failed and you came.”

  I bit back the urge to remind the novice that I had asked him to disclose nothing to anyone yet and said, “Harwood, you should meet with these partisan novices as soon as may be.” I added privately that he had better coerce them to make sure there were none among them like to betray us.

  But Elkar said eagerly, “That is why I came. There is a prayer meeting tonight that will be attended by all the novices from this sector and by a Herder who will rant at us about serving Lud with a pure heart. I was thinking you could make him stop and then talk in his stead.”

  “You would have us address all the novices?” I asked in disbelief. “Surely not all of them are ready to rise against the Faction!”

  “Of course not,” Elkar said. “But you can force the others to obey.”

  “This is getting out of hand,” Harwood sent to me forcefully enough to let me know he blamed me. Then he asked Elkar to describe a prayer meeting. As the novice obliged, Cinda made some signals to the other shadows, which Elkar noticed and translated as a suggestion that all the dissenters had better be killed. The other shadows nodded with such ferocious expressions that I found myself wondering if, after all, they did think as Cinda did. Then Elkar said calmly that it might be the best idea.

  I farsent uneasily to Harwood that we had best be careful we did not light a taper of rage that would set the whole compound ablaze. The coercer nodded slightly and bade me leave it to him. Then he told Elkar he hoped that the novice had done or said nothing to make his masters guess something was afoot. Elkar laughed, saying that his own master was so excited over a new kind of ink that had been delivered that he would not have noticed if the novice was walking about naked. Then he frowned and added that the Herder who had brought the ink had told his master that Salamander had sunk the Orizon not because mutants had boarded it, as had been reported that morning, but because the Hedra aboard had contracted a deadly plague in the Land.

  “A plague?” I echoed aloud, unable to see how such a rumor could have arisen unless something had leaked about the null that Ariel was taking to the west coast. I turned to Harwood, but his eyes had the distant look that meant one of the others was farseeking him. After a long moment, he said, “That was Tomrick. He says he walked around the top of the wall until he calculated he was above us, and as he had hoped, he was able to farseek me. He is going to stay in that position now so the others can farseek any news to him to be relayed to us. But he says there is a mist rolling in, and from what he has seen, it won’t be long before it comes into the compound. Apparently, Hilder says it is already creeping along the channel.”

  I stood up decisively. “I am going to Fallo. I need to know what is happening with the shipfolk.”

  “I will come with you,” Reuvan said. “I have slept enough and feel useless here.”

  Elkar broke in to ask if he and Cinda could come with me. I was about to refuse when Harwood farsent that I ought to let them accompany me to the gates since we would make a reasonable entourage; I could wear Falc’s robe again and go as a ranked Herder, accompanied by a lantern-bearing shadow, a novice, and a Hedra escort, for of course Reuvan was bald and clad in a Hedra robe like the coercers.

  I told the novice that he and Cinda could come as far as the black gates but that it would look suspicious if they came farther, since Cinda had told me that neither novices nor shadows ever left the compound. And besides that, Elkar ought to be at the prayer meeting. He looked disappointed but acquiesced willingly enough. We were soon descending the hidden stairs and passing through t
he once more deserted laundry. It was dusk, and the laundry yard was veiled in mist, but Elkar shrugged, saying that the mist would grow much thicker before it abated. I asked if he would not be missed, and he answered that his master would merely assume that Elkar was still in the dining hall.

  “Do the Herders keep such casual control of you?” I asked, surprised.

  He shrugged. “They keep a tight hold on new novices, but with novices my age, it depends on the master. Mine is old and less strict than many,” he added.

  Two priests appeared before us in the mist, followed by a lantern-bearing shadow. The Herders nodded to me without breaking off their conversation, but I noticed the shadow flick her fingers at Cinda.

  “She asked if it was true that mutants had secretly invaded the compound,” Cinda told me when I asked what had been signaled.

  As we walked, the mist thickened as Elkar had predicted, and I noticed how empty the streets and lanes now were. Was it a curfew or the mist? I wondered.

  Soon a group of Hedra came marching along the street toward us. I prayed they would march past without bothering us. But the leader stopped and commanded us to do the same. I obeyed and was relieved to find that there was no barrier as I entered his mind. A relentless fanaticism snaked through his thoughts like a river of poison, sickening me, but there was no time to be squeamish. I took complete and rough control of him, but before I could make him dismiss us, one of the other Hedra asked me suspiciously, “Where are you going, Master?”

  “Our master is ill and wishes a potion from the healers,” I said in as low a voice as I could manage.

  “Who is your captain?” asked the same Hedra of Reuvan.

  I jabbed coercively at the Hedra in my control. He gave a loud bray of pain and clutched at his stomach, and the other Hedra looked at him in astonishment.