I drew him standing in the center of an apocalypse of flames, peaceful at last with nothing more asked of him. Those he had rescued stood to one side and those he had failed were with him in the pyre. When I was done I lay back. The familiar tightness in my chest had eased.
The attendant came for Savannis and wheeled him away still sleeping in his chair. Then I, too, slept through the evening and the night without a single dream.
Savannis did not come the next day, nor would they take me to him. “He needs his rest,” was all the explanation I was given.
I asked for water and drank it slowly, staring hard at Riattis’s peaceful, dying face in my picture. With the tightness in my chest eased somewhat I felt more alert. I turned the picture over and looked at the clean, white back.
First I drew the tree near Rennis’s house, which Saft’ir and Tyannis used to climb. I drew them high in its branches, only their faces peering out. As I drew, their faces turned angry, scornful and accusing. Under my chalk, Tyannis’s hand appeared, raised, drawn back to fling something: a large nut, hard and hurtful. His hands were full of nuts; he and Saft’ir had gathered them from the branches to throw down at a shadowy figure crouching on the ground.
Who is he? Why are they so furious at him?
Instead of houses, trees appeared; they were in the forest. I hate the forest, I’ve always hated the forest. Dark and close and dangerous, its massive trees constricting the flow of air. Things lurk behind those trees, terrible things... The forest is an attack on Wind, an illness.
I sweated as I drew, breathing quickly and reaching repeatedly for the glasses of water and juice the attendants replenished without disturbing me. Even the Ghen healer, seeing my frown of concentration as I took a sip of juice without looking up from my drawing, sat down without saying a word: a miracle almost as great as paper.
I drew the dark, silent forest and stretching from behind every tree I drew ominous shadows: the fierce, nearly-forgotten shadows I’d seen in Dayannis’s painting. Broghen. I felt my chest tightening. My chalk moved of its own volition back to the figure huddled beneath the central tree.
I wanted to make him leap up and run, but where could he run, surrounded by the menacing specters of Broghen? I wanted to make him climb to safety, but the accusing faces above would not allow it. Why was he staring at the ground? Reaching down as though something had fallen from his hands? What was that, lying tiny and still and broken at his feet?
Suddenly I was drawing a hail of nuts pounding down on him. “Kill him,” I muttered, “Kill him!”
I threw down my chalk and snapped out my claws.
Just as quickly other hands grabbed my wrists and held them still.
“No!” my parent cried. “Hate me, Yur’i, despise me! It’s my fault, not yours.”
I looked at Gant’i, holding my wrists so hard my fingers were growing numb, as though if he held me tightly enough he could pull me back to sanity.
“You never told me!” I cried. “Everyone knew why Tyannis had no sibling, everyone but me.”
The healer, still sitting beside my mat, spoke now: “Didn’t you know, Yur’i?”
I looked at him, and the pain burst over me. I gasped for breath, snapped open my claws again to tear at my closed throat, but my parent still held me. “I knew!” I screamed, “I knew! But no one would talk about it!”
“I was afraid!” Gant’i’s anguished cry broke through to me. I looked at him, shocked. My parent, afraid?
He sank back on his heels still holding my wrists, but more gently now. “Afraid you’d hate me for putting your life at risk. You were born a year premature, Yur’i, struggling to hold back a fully-developed Broghen. The miracle is that you prevented it from tearing apart Rennis’s insides and hurting Tyannis, as well. You saved Rennis and tried to save your womb-siblings. It’s not your fault the Broghen killed Tyannis’s sibling. It’s mine! I put you all at risk!” He released my hands, helpless now.
“I don’t ask you to forgive me.” His voice was so low I could barely hear him. His eyes, staring at me, were as dry as death. “I ask you to blame me. Blame me, and live.”
I swayed backwards, exhausted. Gant’i slumped before me, his head bent.
“Leave us,” the healer spoke gently to my parent. “Yur’i needs to rest. Perhaps he can begin to heal now.”
I slept for a long time. When I awoke, the picture of my guilt was still beside me. There was Riattis, standing between those he had failed and those he had saved. Riattis at peace.
I turned the paper over again and began to draw. In one corner I drew my parent’s face as he watched me trying to die. In another I drew Mant’er’s face with its terrible lines of loss. In the third corner I drew Savannis, the way he looked at the children when he forgot a story in the middle of its telling. And in the last corner I drew my own face.
I’d already drawn myself in this picture, crouching under the tree looking down at the tiny womb-sibling I’d failed to protect. This time I drew myself looking up at the three faces in the corners. At Mant’er, who needed me to tell his story. At Savannis who needed me to pass on the stories and paintings of the Bria. And at Gant’i, who needed me to forgive us both.
I drew my face at peace, like Riattis’s. I drew my hands not open and empty but cupped, as Savannis had cupped them when I was a child and found him wounded on the river. He had agreed then to come back to life for me. I could do no less for him.
I drew what I hoped to become, not what I was.
***
Before Savannis died I went to his room and told him that I would tell the children’s stories if Council allowed it.
He reached for my hands. “Whether or not,” he signed into my palm.
“Whether or not,” I agreed, “but only until I find a Bria storyteller.
Council Relations
(Briarris)
“Excuse me. Sorry. Forgive me.”
I navigated my way as carefully as I could between the crowded Bria, flushing at the need to brush against them, infringe upon the personal space I’d been taught to honor all my life. I tried to ignore the fact that I was deliberately and repeatedly stepping between Bria and the breath of Wind. But how else could I reach the steps that led to Council Chambers?
I was shocked that they didn’t move aside, that they forced this vulgar behavior upon me. Looking up, I caught sight of Anarris standing on the top step of the verandah. His face was wreathed in a triumphant grin. I lost some of my hesitancy then and pushed my way forward without apologies.
Ahead of me I saw Rennis, his eye cast down, still murmuring his regrets as he reluctantly advanced. I caught up to him and clasped his arm. He looked up at me, startled. I tilted my head significantly. He followed my gaze and I felt him stiffen when he saw Anarris watching us.
“A friend is more than breath to me,” I said, giving him permission to break the short space between us. Never had I uttered those words with more sincerity and I could see the relief on his face also, as he braced himself against me. Together we made our way through the crowd and up the stairs.
When we reached the verandah I turned and surveyed the crowd. I had dreamed of serving these Bria, of being lifted up by their gratitude and support as I fulfilled my Council duties.
I have done everything for you, I wanted to cry out to them. How can you deny me your approval? But I said only, “Forgive me for coming, even for a moment, between you and the breath of Wind.” Let them reflect on the fact that they had forced it on me. The shame was theirs.
We waited a full remove, Rennis and I and a handful of other senior councilors, sitting in the closed-Council room. One of the Ghen offered to clear a path through the throng of Bria, with the help of the other Ghen councilors present. The Bria with me sat silent, stunned by the suggestion. Finally I managed to murmur, with Igt’ur translating, that relations between Ghen and Bria were strained enough without a show of force on the part of Ghen councilors.
At least Darillis was no longer on
Council. He’d canceled the last session of closed-Council at the end of his term, when a crowd half this size had come to object to our meeting. I suspected that Triannis had set this up with Anarris, letting him know whenever closed-Council met and what the issues might be.
Triannis hadn’t been invited onto closed-Council after his sixth year as a councilor, and knew now that he’d never be admitted. I could understand his resentment, but it was his choice not to join and bear children. Closed-Council members had to know of Broghen, and how could we entrust that secret to a Bria who didn’t carry the shame of birthing one? Who didn’t go home and look into the soft eyes of his younglings and realize what such knowledge would do to them?
I was glad to leave that train of thought when Council Chair and the last of the councilors arrived. There were only two proposals before us: Yur’i’s offer to be acting storyteller until he could find and train a Bria storyteller, and Chair Ghen’s request that an expedition to the mountains be dispatched at once. Our discussion lasted for five removes, even though there was no real dissension. None of us was in a hurry to face the crowd outside again. Both proposals were accepted.
When we left the building we saw two lines of young Ghen forming a walkway for us between the waiting Bria. Shock and outrage were clear on the delicate faces of the Bria where they stood, swaying slightly, behind the heavy presence of the Ghen. Chair Ghen ordered the Ghen back to their compound as soon as we Bria councilors had passed through the crowd.
My legs trembled under me as I walked home. It was clear from Chair Ghen’s reaction that the young Ghen had acted spontaneously, giving us their assistance.
But a line had been crossed. Ghen had stood against Bria. Ghen had stood between Bria and Bria, throwing their weight into the fragile balance of a Bria dispute. Were we still Bria councilors, now that the Ghen had made our position theirs? They had broken a trust between Ghen and Bria with their display of force, and made it appear that we councilors had broken faith also with those we had promised to serve.
Could the trust that made it possible for us to live together ever be restored?
Shadows
(Tyannis)
Curse the street lamps! I crept between the houses, hugging shadows. Why do Bria so dislike the dark?
As if in answer I stumbled over a large rock. I stopped, hardly breathing.
The night was silent (another reason to dislike it) with all the reassuring sounds of birds and insects and small creatures quieted in sleep. Their stillness made me nervous. The night is as much a part of Wind as daylight is, I reminded myself sternly, and no more fearful for my inadequate sight.
“Wind is full of shadows,” I once told my matri, after a trip to the woods with Gant’i and Saft’ir.
“Wind would be dark without us,” he replied. “The Ghen are like the oil in a lamp, protecting the Bria at their center, its slender wick. Together, we create light.”
“We create shadows, too,” I argued, annoyed by his habit of turning everything into a moral lesson. I looked down at my own shadow, hiding behind me from the evening lamplight. I hopped a little to see it dance.
“Light and shadow, both,” Matri murmured.
A silly conversation and sillier still the nickname that came of it: Shadow. The Ghen call me that because my fur is black and because I can move in the forest as silently as they, and stand as still, without ever letting on how dizzy it makes me. They say it with amusement. The Bria call me Shadow because I follow the Ghen into the woods. They say it with derision.
I don’t let on that I care either way. At least, I prefer “Shadow” to “Tyannis.” When I was little I once asked Saft’ir and Yur’i to call me “Tyn’is.” Saft’ir just laughed, but Yur’i looked at me sadly. He knows what it is to want to be what you’re not. It was he who first called me “Shadow.” He says it with understanding.
I needed to be a shadow now. Just a shadow, creeping through the city to the northern wall behind the Ghen compound. If I were to be seen, my bed-roll and bundle of food would give me away at once. As though I were doing something wrong! I’m not a captive in my own city. Ah, but I feel that way, as I navigate the narrow walls of convention, wishing I were neither Ghen nor Bria, just myself.
Passing the Ghen compound, I moved even more cautiously. Ghen see well in the night. I was glad of that, even if it made my escape more difficult. I would be following the trail of the Ghen exploration party. I could take comfort in the knowledge that the darkness of the forest had already been pierced by their sight. They would leave safety in their wake for me to walk through.
I approached the wall carefully. Stillseason was over, but it was still well-guarded. On the other side I heard heavy Ghen footsteps retreating to my left. I must get over before the guard returned. I unwound the narrow rope I carried, tied a loop in one end and tossed it over a flapping pennant on the wall. It slipped down around the raised post that held the pennant. I pulled myself up, balancing precariously at the top to pull the rope free, then jumped down on the other side. Saft’ir had thought it amusing to show me how young Ghen sometimes sneaked into the forest at night, and was surprised when I mastered the trick. Even he misjudged me.
I paused a moment at the edge of the forest. So dark! No, not darkness, just shadows: black shadows, like me. Shadows that would hide, not harm me. I ran into their cold embrace before the guard walking this corner of the wall could come upon me.
***
The Ghen trail was difficult to follow, even though they weren’t being particularly careful this close to our city. I walked until the darkness turned to gray, until the sun had climbed above the trees and pierced their leafy canopy. I walked, and rested, and walked, following the trail of the Ghen.
Although at night I feared the forest, in the daytime I loved walking through it as I always had, with its dappled pools of sun and shade, its soprano of birdsong and rhythmic rustle of wind-shimmering leaves. Early one morning, still shaking off the tremors of the night, I came upon a small sadu’h, nibbling on the branches of a cappa bush. He froze when he saw me and I stopped, too, regarding his wide-eyed terror with compassion. His mating species were diggers, not hunters.
What if my ancestors had had no Ghen to protect them? What if today we had no farms producing food behind the wall that kept our peninsula safe from the predators on Wind? What if we had to leave our city daily to feed ourselves within the capricious forest? I meant to prove that I, too, could live here, but I had more understanding of what such a life might cost after three days and nights alone in the woods.
“Go in peace, little sadu’h,” I murmured. “May the Creator Wind guard you and all the small and helpless children of Wind.”
I would have to be careful not to say such things when I finally joined the group of Ghen. They ate wild sadu’h. As though he heard my thoughts, the little thing leaped in fear and dashed away. But I felt safer after that, because I had dispensed life on a creature even more timid than I.
It is our culture as much as our inherent nature that makes Bria weak and dependent. We should be taught to fight and to use Ghen weapons and to walk unafraid in the forests. Such opinions did not make me popular among my Bria classmates who had not been raised with Ghen, but I didn’t care. I’m right, and this adventure would prove it.
After that, I found it exhilarating to walk alone through the forest. I knew I would join the Ghen in another day or two, when they’d gone too far to send me home. In the meantime, the sense of omnipresent danger made me feel intensely alive. The leaves were greener, sun and shadows sharper, the ruberries more crimson and sweeter than any I had tasted. The noises and the scents of the forest were as clear and vivid to me as Savannis’s stories were to Yur’i, and I walked, haloed in the great excitement of simply being alive and young and on an adventure.
I finished my water on the fourth day. I’d hoped to make it last five, but my throat was dry with nervousness each night no matter how I reassured myself, and during the days I had to travel h
ard to keep up with the Ghen. The more I tried to ration myself, the stronger my thirst grew. I dared not leave the trail to find a stream, though I knew there must be one near enough for the Ghen to send some of their number to fill their water skins. Even knowing their general direction and walking less than a day behind, I had trouble tracking them.
Although they weren’t being particularly careful, they left almost no sign of their passage: leaves brushed aside on the forest floor, ruberries plucked neatly instead of eaten off the vine as an animal would have, a trail of discarded stems leading away from the patch. If Saft’ir hadn’t taught me to track, I would have lost them. The thought terrified me. Better that I suffer a little thirst than find myself completely adrift in the forest, so far from home.
I conceived a daring plan. I would sneak that night into the Ghen camp and steal some of their water! I increased my pace in order to catch up to them, but they were also moving quickly and at dusk I knew by their trail that I’d only gained a little. I’d have to walk all night and enter their camp when dawn was beginning to lighten the dark woods. The advantage of my black fur in the night would be lessened, and I’d be tired.
Perhaps it was my exhilaration at having already accomplished what no Bria ever had—living alone in the forest for nearly five days—or else the knowledge that even the juicy ruberries wouldn’t slack my thirst another day. Whatever the reason, I decided to do it. After all, they were Ghen. Saft’ir was among them. Even if my plan failed and I was caught, I had nothing to fear from these hunters. But if I succeeded, they would be forced to accept me as an equal.
How could I have imagined that I, a Bria on my first journey through the forest, could steal past an experienced Ghen watch into their camp? Even considering myself more Ghen than Bria, it was sheer youth and arrogance to believe I might succeed. But that youthful arrogance saved my life.
Walls of Wind and the Occasional Diamond Thief Boxed Set Page 19
