The Vastness

by Hausladen, Blake;

  “Ahh. We moved it all inside the house as soon as we arrived so that it could dry. We’ve plenty for now.”

  We spotted the hole in the roof of the woodshed as we passed. Natan said nothing about it, and Dame Franni had cups of mate and hot biscuits waiting for us inside. She apologized for chasing us off.

  Warmed and somewhat presentable, we found our way up to a corner room with intact windows, a warm fireplace, and the girls huddled with my wife in a fort built of caribou hides and wool blankets. Liv handed me an open book.

  “This one, please. It is my favorite.”

  The girls came awake, and I managed a proper reading the tale. They fell asleep before I got to the part where the monster knocked over the bed, but Liv listened straight through to when the boy flung open the shutters and defeated Adanas.

  Liv took me by the arm while Madam Invern tucked the girls in.

  “What for tomorrow, my love?” I asked.

  “You are going to teach Emi and Pia how to read. Don’t look at me like that. You suggested it to her.”

  “I did? That was foolish of me. What do I know about teaching children?”

  “You’re the only one here who grew up with tutors. Perhaps now is a good time to figure out how to be a teacher,” she said. It was not a question.

  “Is that what most fathers do? Teach their children themselves?”

  “Most don’t, but the good ones do,” she said with soft eyes and when I agreed she smiled.

  How could I not?

  She helped me wash the last of the sap from my hair before we found our room. From its window overlooking the garden we saw a fast galley swing in and tie onto the jetty, undoubtedly there to take Emi’s drawing to Rahan in the morning.

  Liv read my mind and helped me find a letter box. It took me a moment to get my divonte-battered brain to rally, but I managed a proper bit of correspondence.

  The 9th of Winter, 1196

  Rahan Yentif, Exaltier of Zoviya and Warden of the Warrens,

  Our move to the estate has gone better than I expected, though perhaps exactly as you anticipated. Emi seemed much relieved to be out of the city, and so much so that she is able to hold my daughter in her arms without apparent risk. The location appears secure, and I dare say the season will pass comfortably.

  You must also be aware of the many entrapments that awaited me here. It will be a winter of poorly hatched plots, each wanting me to step into the lead role. The convocation of Arilas and kings in the west may not be as loyal a gathering as you believe it to be.

  Please, brother, let me know if there is anything you wish of me other than to stay silent and removed from all things.

  With all respect and fealty,

  Evand Yentif

  “What do you think?” I asked and handed it to her.

  “Read it to me,” she said, but I begged off, rubbing my sore eyes. She held the tablet in her hand and looked from me to the words and back again. Her face grew scarlet.

  She didn’t know how to read. I stood slowly as her anger broiled behind her eyes.

  “Please forgive me. You hide it so well that I’d forget. Please, sit here with me.”

  She sat down and held my arm while I read it to her. When I was done, she said, “That will be well received. You can send it with Emi’s drawing?”

  “I will be drafting her notes to go along with the maps, so it will be easy enough to include.”

  She blew out the candles and pulled me toward the bed. When we were snuggled close beneath the blankets, she whispered, “Can I look over your shoulder while you teach Emi and Lilly?”

  “We both have some learning to do,” I said. “We’ll do it in private, just the four of us.”

  Her ferocious pride made her body a hot as smoldering coals, but it did not lash out. I laid my head down in hopes of soothing it further and thought through all the many tutors I’d suffered upon the Deyalu. They were a spineless breed, but there had been a few who’d known how to break down the components of a lesson and draw me through a complex problem in well planned, engaging steps.

  “Can I tell you my notion for a lesson plan in the morning?”

  “Fine,” she said, snuggled close, and kissed my back before she rolled over fell asleep.

  I was smiling when my eyes closed, I think, plotting a lesson plan rather than a coup.

  My letter to Rahan went with Emi’s drawing the next day. Another galley arrived and the rest of her things from the tower filled the house, the windows were replaced, and on the 11th, Emi, Liv, and Pia joined me in the library for their first reading lesson.

  Liv sat between the girls and it was a blessing that it was the three of them. All the unruly animations of the girls were restrained by Liv presence, and Liv’s pride was similarly tempered. They took it all far more seriously than I’d taken my lessons when I was the girls’ age. We did not have the Deyalu’s endless supply of vellum and such but there was enough. I had my lesson plans ready, and like the small skirmishes of a long war, we marched from letters to words and look forward to a rigorous campaign that included grammar, sentences, and essays. Awaiting Emi’s triumph was lessons in cartography, and she could not wait to make her first proper etchings.

  I was not the best teacher, but for them, perhaps I was the right one.

  The snow fell hard as the season wore on, and the Kaaryon went to sleep around us. Rahan never replied to my letter but did send the occasional notes asking questions about features of Emi’s evolving drawings. He was most interested in the command structure of Yarik’s forces during the long lull that followed his taking of newly named Deyalu Island and the palace, and the visitors he received from Tadadi in the west and Alsonelm in the north. Emi could not pick out individual as easily at that distance, so Emi and Rahan began sorting the people around him into groups that were supposed to have identical connections. It proved an excellent method as Emi could easily tell which groups were not homogenous and the relationship strengths between them at odds. I got to watch in slow stages as his grip upon the city and provinces solidified one new street and partnership at a time.

  Rahan failed to get Alsonelm to release its archives or recognize him as Exaltier, judging but the cold relationship he had with the small group Alsonelm sent downriver, but the lords of the western borderlands and the merchant chiefs of his river became as loyal as Sewin and his fleet. Some of these men stayed with him as he moved himself into the palace.

  But as remarkable as this victory him, many other groups fell away, and it was soon the case that he was alone more than he was not. I began to worry. The Bleau of Kuet and a rising class of men from the Warrens like Admiral Sewin and Captain Natan were kept close enough to serve as a buffer from the rest. None of the substantial noble families had a place close to him. The Serm of Aneth and the Pickesh of Thanin were kept far away. The newly risen Ludoq of Havishon tried to stay close and succeeded to a degree. The only large family Rahan seemed to care about was the Corneth in Alsonelm, but they resisted his every overture.

  It was an odd way to communicate with him, but our correspondence regarding the many factions and families that swirled around him became as familiar as rhythm of the lessons. Emi became a master of labeling the clusters of people upon her drawings while Liv and Pia labeled all the many objects in the house. Liv and Dame Franni also had Natan’s 6th division men busy during their idle hours in one of the outbuildings, keeping out clothes mended and fresh, but I stayed as far away from that work as I could.

  Meanwhile, Yarik’s army grew ten times as fast as Blathebed division, and on the 48th of Winter, Emi added the label “shipyard” next to Yarik’s immense camp.

  I would have despaired, if I did not know the exact count of men and ships on both sides. Yarik had the men he needed to crush us but would not have ships enough to force a crossing until well into spring, as slow as his supplies were moving through the snow.

  But we gave the stalemate little thought. We hunkered down on our snowy bit of river
instead and fought a slow and relentless campaign through the Valley of Conjugation and on across the Plains of Grammar. The enemy divisions of words and rules were resolute, but no match for my stout generals.

  The long season was nearing its end when, at a small but universally attended ceremony in the gardens, Emi and Pia graduated from the Evand Winter Academy. The plaques Master Invern made for the girls were gilded squares of steel with etched lettering and silver inlays. My father could not have commissioned better for his sons.

  Emi had her plaque in one hand and my hand in the other when she asked when we would begin the cartography classes. My description of the topography and etching lessons to come earned me a hug and a happy laugh from the crowd.

  Later that night I presented Liv’s plaque to her in private and asked her to put her head upon the floor as my father has demanded the day I’d graduated from the Urmand Academy.

  She punched me on the jaw instead. My head snapped around and I fell hard.

  I was lying on my back when she picked up the award and hugged it to her chest as though it were our daughter.

  “Thank you for this, Evand, but never forget who your father was,” she said and left me to pick myself up and tend to my wounds.

  I was still seeing stars when the thought bungled its way through my idiotic brain.

  It was my father that had enslaved them.

  I tiptoed around her for several days after that, unsure how to apologize. I left off the attempt, though, knowing that no words could undo my idiocy. I worked hard to be the best teacher I could instead, and we settled back to a regular pace, while the white of winter began to let go.

  Rahan’s notes got shorter as the bite of the air softened, and it was during a bright morning of thawing sunlight that a letter arrived.

  The 84th of Winter, 1196

  Evand,

  As the Spirit of the Earth shakes off the cold and we prepare to fight in her name, there can be no confusions between the crown and the people. The Yentif name is for those of my family who will rule Zoviya, and must be withdrawn from all others.

  Barok has taken the Vesteal name of his mother’s family and it is fitting that you do the same. Henceforth you will be known simply as Evand Grano, and come the spring you will join your family in Alsonelm and serve there as my envoy.

  Savior of the Warrens, Warden of the Preservatory, Water Builder, and Grand Exaltier of Zoviya,

  Rahan Yentif

  “He took away your name?” Emi asked, looking over my shoulder.

  I’d not heard her approach and did not know how to respond. Liv and Emi stood in the doorway with her parents. Liv picked up the letter and her expression darkened.

  “It will be nice to be with your family again,” Emi said to me.

  “I do not know any of them. I was taken away from my mother when I was five, and I’ve not met her parents or any of their kin. There are several uncles and cousins in Thanin, and a couple dozen more distance relations that all wear the name, but only to enjoy its benefits. I have no idea at all which of them call Alsonelm home.”

  “I would like to have a name someday,” Emi said.

  This struck me as hard as Liv’s punch, and I could not abide one moment longer how much the Yentif had taken from those I loved.

  “You could take my name, Emilia, if you think Liv and I might make good parents.”

  “Adopt her?” Madam Invern said with a gasp and began to cry.

  Liv set her hand gently upon my shoulder. Her eyes were warm.

  “Emilia Grano,” Emi whispered. A single tear rolled slowly down her cheek. “The three of us?”

  Liv said, “Every little girl needs a mother.”

  “I would love it. Oh, please. All three of us. Grano.”

  Liv eyed the letter once, before collecting Emi into a hug and wiping away her tears.

  The room filled with happy laughter and Emi smiled like I’d never seen before. She pointed at the letter and said, “I can’t wait to tell Rahan.”

  Arlan cleared his throat. “Oh, my. He won’t like that.”

  “I know,” Emi said and stood up as though she intended to march to Bessradi to confront him. “It serves him right. He won’t like when I tell him I am going north with Evand, either, but he knows not to make me angry.”

  Liv took me by the hand and kissed the spot where she’d punched me.

  “Father,” Emi said as though she’d used the word a million times. “Can we go work on my map some more?”

  Together, we found our way to the library.

  38

  Sikhek Vesteal

  I woke on my side with uncountable hurts to the banging of a longbow. I lay inside a small hut with a thatched roof upon a shelf of stone—glorious and unmoving. A tepid breeze brushed by face. I half sat up and collapsed back, but not before learning that my hands and chest were leather-wrapped bones.

  The yew bow banged again—designed to wake me, undoubtedly.

  Geart had gone overboard.

  The thought struck me like a blow, and I gasped at the memory. I’d been yanked awake as he sank to the bottom, my soul torn as though I was being punishment for it.

  Without Geart, stopping Aden or any of his Ashmari would be next to impossible. Soma had to touch them to kill them, and none of the Chaukai with us could keep away their heavy touch for more than a moment.

  I reached out as though to sing. The nouns and verbs inside my head felt like dusty crumbs, but the oppression I’d felt aboard ship was gone. I relaxed back, confused by all that had happened.

  Had it been Geart who’d stopped my magic? When had Geart gone overboard? So long ago it seemed. We were ashore somewhere far to the north of the Bunda-Hith. Aneth or Dahar, judging by the hint of rapeseed oil in the air and the pinto bean straw used for the thatching.

  The barking of the longbow stopped and a young yellowcoat officer entered. Tayler was her name, but the rank she wore did not match my memory of her. She knelt down beside me, propped up my head, and spooned a broth between my cracked lips and loose teeth. As the warmth washed through my ragged body, she covered me with a blanket and my hurts drifted away.

  The next time I was aware of myself, the earth was trembling. I’d been seated in a wide cushioned chair with a blanket upon my lap and legs and the warm sun beaming in across me in opposition to the chill in the air. Thin wisps of dust fell from the thatching and the chair creaked.

  The quake was odd, but the view beyond the hut held my attention. A line of bare-trunked fir trees edged the long path outside the hut. The stone walkway curled down a bare hill toward a wide mountain pass. Below it all east, across forests and fields, the green ocean was hidden by a low bank of clouds.

  I was high in the forested hills of Aneth looking east down the Sesmundi tithe road toward the city. I’d stood upon that hill many centuries earlier. A series of wide quarries scared those hills and their stones had been used to build the walkway as well as a third of the road to Alsonelm.

  There was another long valley nearby—an old and ugly place on the far side of the mountains above an unoccupied scrubland. My loyal Savdi-Nuar lived there, mining the poisonous vermillion desired by so many.

  A gust of cold mountain air washed the heat from my face and brought with it the tang of smoke. Somewhere in the valley below, the farmers were burning the pinto bean fields to make way for a new crop.

  Chief Tayler and a group of Chaukai made their way up the path. They stopped outside and she brought in a heavy bowl of beans and a mug of mate.

  “You are awake today?”

  “It would seem,” I said and pointed at the smoke. “Is it spring already?”

  “No. They couldn’t harvest this year because of attacks by the Yud corsairs,” she said. “They’re burning the rot left in the fields to prevent blight. It’s already the 68th of winter.”

  I lost interested in the date as the warm aroma of the food swirled around me. I seized the bowl and devoured the mash. The mate washed it down in on
e long smooth rhythm of gulps. I sat with heavy eyelids and breathed in the earthy scents of the Jivillion Mountains.

  It was all too much. My skin itched. My fingernails were dry and ragged. My hair had grown long enough to tickle my shoulders. The sounds of birds and insects pushed their way into my ears, and then the rasp of saws. Somewhere close, a rabbit screamed amidst a tussle of brush. A flapping of a peregrine’s wings followed, and then a brief silence before the rest of the forest creatures went back about their business.

  “Winter you said?” I asked, as she brought a fresh mug.

  “The Earth is fighting back,” she replied, and I recalled the tremor. She pointed and I managed to lean forward and turn my head north. Over the rolling green peaks that crowded the pass, Mount Amey and the smaller Mount Sesson closer along the coast were belched columns of ash. “We keep hoping to hear that the high peaks in Yudyith have blown, too,” she said, “but so far it is only our friends who are covered in ash. The Chaukai magic is getting stronger, too. How is your magic doing?”

  It was the topic I expected. I did not have to guess at why I’d been preserved, but did not want to discuss my condition.

  She changed tacks before I could turn the topic. “Is Dia alive?”

  “My magic has never been strong enough to answer such a question, but I can tell you that Aden has not made any more Ashmari. We would be blanked in snow if the Priests’ Home had new servants.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “We failed to stop him, but he has also failed. The child’s bones have not been used, so they may still be alive.”

  “What magic do you have left? You proved useless aboard ship.”

  I almost rose to this bait, but held my anger in check. “Something stopped us out there. Geart or Aden, using something new and powerful. As for my magic, it could be made strong again. Would Soma have me fighting the Yud or Aden?”

  “You remain loyal to the mission?”

  “I would see Aden destroyed.”

  “What would allow you the strength to do it?

  “Do you know of the Savdi-Nuar?”