Colors in the Dreamweaver's Loom

by Beth Hilgartner

  "Would someone please explain to me," Zan put in, "why these Vemathi think they can order everyone about? It seems to me they've taken a very . . ." She hesitated, searching for a word. " . . . a very lordly tone with the Orathi, and no one seems to think it unusual. What makes them think they can just say the word and you will move away from your homes and give them the land?"

  Eikoheh sighed. "'Tsan, it is more tangled than it seems. Once there was friendship growing between our people and the City. The Vemathi are first of all traders, and they thought to trade their goods with us, and, I think, to make us like them. It worked—a little. Some of us left the old ways, built villages like this. But we learned something else: we need the forest. Even those of us who left the old ways need the forest. We discovered we could not become what the Vemathi wanted, we cannot live the way they would have us do. So they lost interest; the roads that they made were allowed to grow over, and we were left to ourselves. Our experience with the Vemathi taught us a lesson: we learned we were made the way we are because the wise gods wanted us this way. It would not suit the Weaver for us to change our color on the Loom. But the Vemathi learned a different lesson: they see our gentleness, our respect for life, and our care for the forest as weakness. They push, we give back; it is our way even as it is theirs. And then, with the help of the Khedathi—who make even the Vemathi seem gentle by comparison—they think themselves unopposable."

  "Who are the Khedathi, then?" Zan asked, struggling to make sense. "People of the sword" was what the word meant.

  "The blond ones," Eikoheh said, "the ones with weapons were Khedathi. They are dwellers in the desert, the dry lands," she explained, forestalling Zan's question. "The Khedathi are a fierce people, for the desert does not encourage gentleness. They are much concerned with honor and skill with weapons; they believe the two are related. Over the years, some of them have bound themselves to Vemathi overlords. The Khedathi provide the force behind Vemathi highhandedness."

  In the considering silence, Karivet spoke anxiously. "Has a gathering of Elders been called?"

  "I'm just going," she told him. "While I'm gone, explain to 'Tsan about the tuvahendi. And eat some of the kemess!"

  "The what?" Zan said as the door closed behind Eikoheh.

  "It's a legend," he told her. "The tuvahendi are people without homes, people who spend their lives moving from place to place. It makes a good story, for we Orathi seldom travel even within the forest, and the only ones who ever venture beyond the forest's edge are the spirit-gifted. Many strange things are said of the Wanderers beside a winter's fire. It is said they are gods in disguise, come to oversee and aid their people; it is said they are shapeshifters and can take the form of beasts; it is said they are great workers of enchantments. Many things are told of them, and much is surely nonsense, but in most of the stories the Wanderers become champions for our people, sometimes at the cost of their own lives. You see, the Orathi do not take up arms against other people, so in ages past we have had need of help from outsiders."

  Zan shivered. "Do the Wanderers usually come from impossibly far lands and not speak the Senathii?" Her voice was edged with sarcasm as she struggled to control her fear.

  "That part is never spoken of in the tales," Karivet replied, showing no reaction to her tone. "The Wanderers simply appear mysteriously—but to people who never venture beyond their own hunting runs, any appearance is mysterious."

  Zan was silent for a long moment, trying to still the quivering apprehension in her stomach. "I don't understand," she said at last. "If you all think me a—a hero out of a legend, why does Eikoheh object to my acting my part?"

  Karivet sighed. "I do not think Eikoheh believes you have stepped out of a legend, but she is afraid others will see you in that light. She wants you to understand what people will expect of you, and she wants you to be able to refuse the role that people may try to thrust upon you."

  "Does she want me to refuse?"

  "I think so."

  Zan frowned. "But why? Surely it is to your advantage to have an advocate?"

  "It is dangerous for you." As he fell silent, Iobeh touched his hand and signed to him. He nodded. "Iobeh suggests I tell you the story of Emiarreh. She came to the Orathi generations ago. At that time the many clans of the Khedathi had ceased their quarreling and banded together under one powerful leader. His name was Khevvad, and he believed it was his destiny to conquer the known world. He and his troops began with the forest, cutting trees and slaughtering our people. The Orathi are not warlike; we consider life sacred. We kill only what we must to survive—and never other people, even in self-defense, since we believe that all peoples are precious to the wise gods. The Khedathi have different laws. They value honor, and their honor is some how linked to their prowess with weapons.

  "In this bloody time, Emiarreh appeared. No one knew from whence she came. She was neither Khedatheh nor Oratheh; she had neither woodcraft nor weapons skill, but she wove songs and tales that transported listeners away from their cares arid troubles. At first she used her talents merely to comfort the Orathi, but as time passed and the slaughter continued, she determined to act directly against the Khedathi. She had heard that the leader of the Khedathi fancied himself clever, so she issued a challenge to him: a riddle game, in which the winner would be the one to determine the fate of the Orathi. The leader accepted Emiarreh's challenge, over the protests of many of the other clan chiefs, and the game commenced.

  "For four days and four nights they riddled, and seemed evenly matched. But toward dawn of the fifth day, it began to seem that Emiarreh would prevail. That fear struck so deeply into the soul of one clan chief, named Gemerral, that he was moved beyond honor. He put poison in the cup from which Emiarreh drank. She died before she could answer one of Khevvad's riddles, and Gemerral claimed she had been struck down by the gods for meddling in the fate of their chosen people. But Khevvad suspected the truth, and to test Gemerral, he took up Emiarreh's cup to offer a toast to victory. Gemerral was forced to confess his treachery and was cast out by his people. In shame, Khevvad disbanded his army and took his people back to the desert. The Orathi were spared, and Emiarreh's memory is revered to this day." Karivet fell silent, his eyes on Zan's face.

  Zan stirred her now-cold kemess. The story troubled her. Emiarreh's death seemed so pointless—she was a victim of fear and spite, not one who had had the heroic death Zan had imagined when Karivet was describing the Wanderers. Finally she set her spoon down and met Karivet's gaze. "You said I was sent by the gods. Is this what you meant—sent to be a Wanderer?"

  He nodded.

  She bit her lip and looked back at her plate. "I can't be!" she burst out. "How can I champion the Orathi? I'm nothing special. I haven't any gifts or talents. If you're right, Karivet, and I've been sent by the gods, they've made a bad mistake."

  Iobeh touched her comfortingly. The gods are inexplicable, but not foolish. If they sent you, there are reasons.

  Zan reacted with horror. "Not you, too!" she blurted. "At least Eikoheh shows sense enough to doubt this foolishness." But even as she spoke, she wondered whether it was true. It would be like the weaver to want Zan to accept her fate with open eyes, instead of just falling into it.

  Zan tried to retreat into the conviction that this was all a dream, but she found that refuge closed. It all made sense; it rang true in a deep, chilling way. She met Iobeh's anxious eyes, then Karivet's. Moved by a fierce desire for certainty, for confirmation of what she feared, she reached over and gripped the boy's wrist. "Why am I here?" she whispered.

  "The Weaver strung your color on the Loom because without you, the Orathi will perish."

  "Will I succeed in saving them?"

  "The Weaver strings the Loom, but you choose your pattern."

  She released him and he pulled his arm away. The silence stretched between them. Finally she looked away.

  "Will you do it?" Karivet asked at last.

  "Have I any choice?" she responded bitterly.
/>   "Of course you have a choice," he replied, shocked.

  She looked up at that, for the first time the hint of a smile softening her expression. "Not if I'm going to be able to live with my conscience. I guess your gods knew what they were doing after all. Tell me," she added, trying to ease the tension, "what will happen at this meeting of the Elders?"

  "They will talk. Everyone will agree that it is terrible and no one will know what ought to be done. Eikoheh will make suggestions and Fafimed will dismiss them. Gurass will counsel caution and Shiheva will wring her hands. After an age, either Thenat or Kassi will remember us and ask to see us, or they will all agree to meet again tomorrow. Then they will go home."

  Zan found herself smiling at the look of disgust on his face. "But how can there be that much to discuss? The Orathi must send someone to the City—I should think it would only be a question of whom."

  "It's a harder question than you think. After all, it must be one of the spirit-gifted, and the spirit-gifted are rare. Besides us, the nearest is Ohmiden. He lives deep in the forest; it would take two weeks to reach him, and even then, he might refuse. It is said he is unpredictable."

  "Why must it be one of the spirit-gifted?" she asked. "Surely this is important enough to cause even the most deeply rooted of you to consider traveling?"

  "One of the things we learned from our association with the Vemathi," Karivet said slowly, "is that we need the forest. When a few Orathi tried to move from the forest to the City, they grew ill and died. Only the spirit-gifted are strong enough to survive the separation."

  Iobeh touched her arm. It is not the will of the wise gods that the Orathi be travelers. The forest is our place, where we belong. We are its guardians, and in return it breathes life into us. We exist for the forest as much as it for us. Suddenly she caught her brother's eye. Eikoheh.

  Karivet shook his head. "It is true that Dreamweaving is a spirit-gift, but it is not like the others. She has given her spirit to the Loom, and it would be her death to part from it."

  "Well," Zan said quietly, "if the Elders wish it, I will go to represent your people." She smiled a little wryly. "Though I will need a guide to the edge of the forest."

  Iobeh gripped her arm. You will not go alone! she signed emphatically. Just then, as if in answer to Iobeh, Eikoheh stormed in, slamming the door behind her.

  "I cannot believe I have wasted the better part of an hour in the company of such spineless idiots! They whined, they wailed, they wrung their hands—did everything except apply their minds to the situation."

  But they always do that, Iobeh signed. Why does it cause such anger today?

  "I could strangle that Fafimed. After all this weeping and wailing, what does he do but say that the stranger can go to the City for us! And they leapt at the idea. I was never so ashamed!"

  "I have reached that decision myself," Zan said with more outward calm than she felt. "You need not distress yourself on my account."

  "Don't say that! You must refuse. It is not your responsibility."

  "Oh, but it is, Eikoheh. Everything points in that direction. I will go: I must."

  "Ah, 'Tsan, think of it!" the old woman protested. "You would be even more a stranger there—and alone."

  Iobeh slammed her fist into her open palm. Not alone. We will go, too.

  "You can't!" Eikoheh cried. "You are only children." Iobeh signed something Zan could not follow; she looked at Karivet and he translated. "We are the spirit-gifted. We have never been children."

  "What other choice do you have if you want to have someone there before the month is up?" Zan asked gently. "Eikoheh, you are honorable—you would not put others into a danger you cannot bear yourself. And you think we do not understand what we are offering, but we do. Besides, there really is no other answer. If the Vemathi are anything like my people, it is easier to stop something before it begins than to interrupt it."

  Eikoheh met their gazes, each in turn, searching for something. Her eyes were touched with sadness, then with resignation. "If you are determined, there is nothing else I can do. They will use you—and it is use, even with your consent, for you don't understand the cost. Didn't Karivet tell you about the Wanderers?"

  "He did." Then, trying to set the old woman at ease, Zan added, "Maybe some winter it will be my tale told at the hearth. I am willing for it to be so."

  "Such tales are more comfortable in the telling than in the living," Eikoheh pointed out. "But don't bother to argue with me. I can see that you have all made up your minds. I will speak to the Elders tomorrow. I will see to it that you have a guide as far as the edge of the forest—even if Fafimed has to go himself!"

  FIVE

  In the end they were spared Fafimed's company, since the Elder Thenat volunteered to be their guide. Fairly early in their first day of travel, they crossed what seemed to be an old, rather overgrown road. When Zan asked Thenat about it, he told her it was left over from the time when the Vemathi traded with the Orathi, but he refused to use it as a path, saying that it was haunted by the wise gods' anger. She tried to get him to elaborate, but he would only shake his head nervously.

  As Thenat led them through the dense forest, Zan often found herself marveling at his woodcraft. He never seemed unsure of their path in the vast wilderness, he moved with less noise than a woodland creature, and he was a fine hunter and good cook, providing varied and interesting meals for them each evening. He spoke seldom, and for all his being one of the Elders, seemed a little in awe of them.

  Their journey from the Tianneh River took three days. On the morning of the fourth, Thenat pointed them in the proper direction and started away. Zan called him back.

  "Why is it," she began uncertainly, "that the Vemathi need so much land? Or didn't we come by the most direct route?" she added, thinking of the overgrown road.

  "We came the fastest way I know," the Elder told her. "As to why, who can answer for the dwellers in the City? They are strange—mad, perhaps—but they are used to having things as they order them. I wish you luck with them, Stranger." Then he turned purposefully and padded into the shadowed undergrowth.

  After a short time the forest thinned to copses and meadowland. A little to their left, they could see the brown track of a road. They made for it. The road climbed gently, the dust scuffing slightly under their feet as they walked. Despite the heat, Zan enjoyed the sun on her face, but she noticed that Iobeh and Karivet looked around nervously. They hadn't been walking long before Iobeh turned and pointed back the way they had come. They saw riders: a Vemathen and three Khedathi, coming up behind them. They moved to the grass verge and waited for the riders to pass, but when they drew abreast, they halted.

  "May the gods smile upon you," the Vemathen hailed them. "It is seldom we see foreigners in our lands. May I make bold to offer you the greetings of the City?" He accompanied his words with a polite bow, which gave Zan a chance to study him covertly. He was older than the messengers who had come to the Orathi. Gray had faded his dark hair and his fair skin seemed stretched too tightly over his beaky features.

  "Thank you," Zan replied, ignoring the uneasiness in her stomach. "We have been sent by the Orathi to parley with your Lord."

  There was a silence; Zan looked down as Iobeh took her hand.

  "What fool's errand is this? Even the odd one is little more than a child."

  Zan's head jerked up as she sought the speaker, but no one's lips were moving. Her stomach fluttered and she tightened her hand on Iobeh's. "My companions are spirit-gifted," she said, "and are honored among their people."

  "Permit me to be the first to bid you welcome," the Vemathen replied easily. "I am Efiran, of the House of Moirre. I trust you will accept our escort into the City. I am certain my Lord looks forward to meeting with you."

  Zan nodded with what she hoped was graciousness. The man gestured to two of his Khedathi retainers, who dismounted and led their horses forward. They were magnificent beasts, black and tall, caparisoned in silver, but Iobeh backe
d away from them, shaking her head. No, she signed. I can't. Karivet stepped forward and stroked the nose of the nearest horse. It won't hurt you, Iobeh, he signed. I can't, she repeated.

  Zan, feeling the intensity of Iobeh's reaction, intervened. "It is very kind of you to offer us—" She gestured to the horses as she realized she had forgotten the word. "But we would prefer to walk. If it suits you, you may leave one of your people to guide us and go ahead."

  Efiran dismounted. "If you will walk, I will walk with you." He gave his reins to one of his entourage and moved toward them. Belatedly, Zan remembered her manners.

  "I am called 'Tsan, and these are Iobeh and Karivet."

  The Vemathen bowed politely. "Have you had a long journey from your dwelling place?" he asked them.

  "Not long," Karivet answered. "We live on the Tianneh River; we have been traveling a mere three days. This is the fourth."

  Zan noted the faint sarcasm in his tone and wondered what Efiran made of it—if indeed he heard it. As they walked, Efiran continued to try to draw Iobeh and Karivet out, and Karivet fielded his questioning with an offhand skill that surprised Zan. He managed to be perfectly civil and utterly unhelpful at the same time. She found herself wishing she had been able to deal as well with all the people who had tried to pump her about her father—she knew she had almost always ended up sounding sullen.

  Efiran was not impervious to hints—even subtle ones—and after a while he fell silent. Zan had a few uneasy moments wondering whether he would start in on her, but apparently he decided against it.

  After what seemed an interminable time, the road reached the crest of the gentle hill it had been climbing, and they had their first glimpse of the City. Zan's breath caught. The City was beautiful. It rose out of neatly cultivated fields, and seemed to be carved entirely of rose and white stone. Impossible and delicate, it perched on the rim of a cobalt-colored bay, with fragile towers and spires rearing up from its center. Beyond the City, the bay was dotted with islands, bits of floating green guarded by white cliffs.