by Kate Elliott
The rain had faded to spits and kisses. Under the veranda, Mai remained dry, but the weary folk crowded into the square were soaking and shivering as a night wind rose out of the southeast. Only the Qin soldiers remained unmoved. No doubt they had survived much more extreme temperatures in their distant home in the grasslands. Then she saw Shai; he, at least, rubbed his arms as if he were cold. He raised a hand to mark that he had seen her, and she touched a finger to her lips in reply. She wept, just a little, to see him whole and safe.
Anji wiped his forehead with the back of a hand, smearing grime. He had a splash of blood on his right cheek. These ornaments gave him a dangerous look as he surveyed the council members, each in turn, and the sweep of rooftops where Olossi climbed the hill beyond. Lamps were lit along the length of the porch. On the streets above, within closed compounds, lamplight glimmered. At length, he looked at Mai, but she shook her head, and he smiled faintly and turned back to the council.
“I am not moved to alter the bargain already sealed. My men and I will take lands west and north of the Olo’o Sea, in those regions of the Barrens where there is decent pasturage.”
Which lands happened to lie near the seeps and fissures where the fire lanterns burn.
“Is there anything else that cannot wait until tomorrow?” he asked the council. “I will arrange for guards to be posted, some from my troop and others from the militia. I believe the threat is over, but we must remain cautious.”
“No one could have survived that fire,” said Calon. “Their leaders surely are dead. Together with Master Feden.”
“He gave his life to save his honor,” said Anji. “It was a worthy death.”
He stepped forward and took Mai’s hand. “Now, if you will, I desire to rest.”
The council members, too, were stunned by the day’s events.
Eliar moved forward before any other could speak. “If you will, Captain Anji, we offer you guest rights in our house. I’ll go ahead to make sure all is ready for you.”
“I accept with gratitude,” said Anji, but he turned his gaze back to examine Mai, searchingly. He bent close, so others could not hear him. “What is different?” he whispered.
“You are alive.” She made sure her voice did not tremble. She was strong enough to do what must be done, but she was so very very very glad she need not do it alone.
“So I am,” he agreed, “although twice dead, once to my father’s people and once to my mother’s people.” Then he smiled, closely, warmly. “You have a secret.”
Remembering what it was, she smiled in answer. She could not help sounding as if she were boasting. “We will have a child.”
He was not a man prone to display, but he grasped her other hand and held it tightly. Anyone might guess what they spoke of, merely by looking at his face. “It seems we have passed through Spirit Gate into a new life.”
And of course, so they had. A parting, a journey, a battle, a new life. A fine tale, truly. There is never any reason for happiness. Yet it exists.
PART SEVEN: RAINS
On the Eve of the Festival
At the Advent of the Year of the Red Goat
53
HANDS CUPPED AROUND a shallow drinking bowl, Joss brooded. He sipped until the bowl was drained dry, then set it down. After pouring a fourth helping of rice wine from the carafe, he placed it back in its basin of hot water and with a sleeve wiped from the table’s top the droplets of water left behind by the pouring. But none of it helped, not the ritual of pouring, not the punch of the wine rising to his eyes, not the peace or the quiet. He sat by lamplight in the master’s cote of Argent Hall, alone except for the whisper of rains on the roof. The doors to the porch were all slid back so he could see outside, but the garden lay in darkness. At the beginning of the wet season, it was always difficult to adjust to a night sky covered in cloud, with no stars or moon to be seen, or to see by.
So it seemed to him. He was waiting in the dark. He was blind, with nothing to guide him. They had won a victory, but only by going against the code of the halls.
Reeves were meant to enforce the law, not to wage war. He could win the argument within his head, claiming they had been given no choice, and know it was true. He could rejoice in his heart that Olossi had been saved, and feel it as worth-while, a bold triumph. But in his gut, he knew any more steps taken down this road would lead to a terrible place where he did not want to go. No matter the reason, they had betrayed the reeves of Argent Hall. They had passed through that gate, and they could never go back and pretend it had not happened.
The rains lulled him. The cool air washed over him, dragging him into sleep.
The dream always unveils itself in an unwinding of mist, but this time there is no journey in the wilderness, no distant figure that vanishes as soon as he glimpses it. She walks right out of the darkness and up onto the porch, and she examines him with an expression of regret mingled with amusement. It hurts to look at her, because in his dream she seems so very ordinary and alive.
“You’re drunk,” she says.
He raises a hand to acknowledge her with an ironic salute. “Of course I am. Whenever I think of you, I drink.”
She shakes her head. “Joss. Do not carry this burden. Do not mourn me. Let it go.”
“I can’t. It won’t let me go. Oh, Marit. Do you know what we’ve done?”
“I know. That’s why I came to warn you: Beware the outlander.”
He chuckled, because the dream was agony: to hear her, to see her. Why must he torment himself? Why throw these words at himself, as if to blame someone else for a decision he had helped plan and carry out? Or perhaps the gods had chosen his dreams as an entrance into his heart, to scold him, since in sleep he could only listen and speak but not, truly, act.
“What are you?” he asked her. “Are you real? Or only a dream, as I fear?”
She displayed both hands, palms facing him. Strong and subtle hands, whose touch he recalled too well. “I am a Guardian now,” she said sadly.
He sighed, feeling the pull of the dream as it slid into impossibility, the place where he was forced to acknowledge that none of it could be real. “The Guardians are gone . . . or else this is their way of punishing me for walking onto forbidden ground . . .”
Twenty years ago, back when he was young.
And he woke, startling out of sleep at the clop of feet on the porch steps. He rose too quickly, and knocked the bowl onto the floor.
“Marit!” he called.
“Oh, the gods,” said the Snake, who was standing on the porch in the soft morning light together with a half-dozen reeves. “He’s drunk. Again.”
“You bastard,” said Joss, picking up the empty carafe and hefting it. “This will make a nice sound, shattering on your head.”
“Enough of that!”
Blinking, he saw who had come with Volias and the others. Leaning on her stick, the commander limped into the room. She had already taken off her boots; all of them had, which meant they had stood on the porch for a while watching him sleep, and babble in his sleep, no doubt. He flushed.
“Set that down, Joss,” she added. “It’s a fine piece of porcelain. It would be a waste to throw it away so lightly.”
Still gripping the carafe, he moved aside, and bumped his foot on the bowl as he got out of her way. The wine had soaked the pillow, but she levered herself down regardless and winced as she got her leg turned the best way. Picking up the bowl, she set it back on the table, then extended a hand. After a moment, Joss gave her the carafe. She placed it beside the bowl.
“Tea, if you will, Volias,” she said. “Send someone, if you would be so kind. All of you, then. Out.”
The Snake smirked. “That’ll be a good dressing-down, if it must be delivered in private.” But he made the words lascivious, and mocking.
“To the hells with you,” snarled Joss.
“Go,” said the commander.
They went. Kesta, at the rear, cast him a look that might have been sy
mpathetic, or gloating, or disgusted; he was just too exhausted to tell the difference.
“This must go quickly,” said the commander. “Don’t sit.”
“My head aches.”
“All the better, for it will ache more after you’ve heard me out.”
He rubbed his eyes, but the ache—and the commander—did not disappear. They were no dream.
“You may be surprised to see me. After the report I received three days ago of the events here at Argent Hall, and in Olossi, I had to come see for myself.”
“What do you mean to do?” he asked wearily. “I’ll take full responsibility. The other reeves were only following my orders.”
“Yes, I’m aware of that,” she said without smiling, without mercy. Pain had cleansed her of humor. It had been years since he had seen her laugh, and she did not look like she’d be laughing now. “I fear the worst. You made a terrible choice, one that will haunt us in the days to come.”
“I know.”
On she went, unsparing in her litany. “In the meantime, Horn Hall’s reeves are still missing. The north is still closed to us. Our control over our own hinterlands shrinks every day. High Haldia has fallen in blood and flames. Toskala and the lands along the river lie under immediate threat. Here, Olossi’s lower town lies half in ruins. Yet Olossi’s council members praise your willingness to act to save them, despite some misunderstanding that, it seems, led you to be imprisoned in a cell beneath their Assizes Tower for several days. This captain they hired, who will be settling in lands to the north and west of here within Argent Hall’s territory, speaks most highly of your leadership and levelheadedness. It seems you have led them to believe you are capable and trustworthy.”
“Eiya!” he said, for the words came at him like a dagger’s point. “Did you mean that to prick quite so much?”
“Just to make sure you are awake to hear the rest of it: I’m assigning you to become marshal here at Argent Hall.”
The shock of the statement made him stammer. “But . . .”
“I am aware that each hall chooses its own marshal from among their own people, although there are exceptions to this custom, which I invoke now. I am aware that Scar will have to uproot for a second time from his accustomed territory, but he is stable enough, and tough enough, to withstand the challenges and make the accommodation to a new territory. Whether you are remains to be seen, but I have spoken to the council in Olossi, and I have spoken to the reeves here, and it is obvious to me that, for the present time, you are the only available and acceptable choice.”
“Argent Hall has lost so many of its eagles, and reeves. We believe that Marshal Yordenas was killed, but his body hasn’t been located. Many who aren’t dead or missing have fled. Less than a quarter of the normal complement remain, although I admit they thanked us for our intervention.”
“It’s said the great eagles cannot be corrupted. That they will, in the end, rid themselves of any reeve who turns wholly against the code of the halls.”
“It’s true that Yordenas had no eagle anyone ever saw. So we were told by those of Argent Hall’s reeves who surrendered into our custody after the battle. He claimed it had gone to the nesting grounds, but maybe it had already abandoned him.”
She nodded. “Come. Let me show you what flew beside me, at the sun’s rising, when I arrived here at dawn.”
For her to sit, knowing she would rise again so soon, made the gesture more pointed. He stepped back deliberately, because he did not want to make the mistake of offering an arm, any aid at all. The struggle was swift, but defeated as surely as it always was. She got her balance, and she hobbled to the porch and, with dexterity born of long practice, got into her boots, which were in any case specially made to ease her condition.
He followed meekly. His head still hurt, but at least the glare of a hostile sun wasn’t spiking him between the eyes. The gravel path was darkened by the wet, but the rains had ceased with the rising of the sun. Their progress through the marshal’s garden went slowly. A flight of eagles spiraled high above, reveling in the morning’s cooling breeze. She said nothing, so he said nothing.
Until they came to the courtyard, long since cleared of the debris of the battle fought five nights back.
All ten perches were taken, bearing unharnessed eagles. When he looked closely at those circling above, he realized that most of them—thirty more, at least—carried no reeve.
“What are all these?” he asked. “Where have they all come from?”
“Argent’s eagles have come home, seeking new reeves,” she said. “There is much to do, Marshal Joss. And your first task will be to rebuild.”
54
After the seventh bell had rung its closing, the temple of the Merciless One lay quiet. The night’s rain had not yet come, and the wind had settled. Only the streaming waters of the river could be heard, all manner of voices melding together in that watery chorus, some deep, some high, some constant and some heard at intervals like complaints. The ginnies slept. A few nocturnal night-reed birds patrolled for flies and midges, and their throaty ooloo calmed those who woke with disturbed dreams. There were many such dreamers in these days, who had before slept soundly.
All at once, erupting out of the drowsy night, a dog began its clamor, joined by a second and a third until the whole rude pack of them were howling and yammering the alert. Lanterns and candles flared to life. Folk stumbled sleepily from their beds, rubbing their eyes, cursing under their breath, whispering questions to the other hierodules and kalos as they emerged in ones and twos onto the verandas.
The dogs hushed as abruptly as if they’d all been throttled. The folk standing in their bare feet in the cool air hushed as well, if not quite as quickly. It seemed that half of them saw him immediately, and the other half felt an inchoate fear, enough to slow their chatter until they spotted him for themselves.
A man stood beside the courtyard’s fountain. A spray of raindrops and grit swirled around him and settled, as though a wind had eddied through the vegetation, caught up this chaff, and now died.
“How did you get in?” called Walla, boldest of those already awake and present. “You can’t have come through the gate. It’s locked for the night. And my good, dear, aged uncle, I just don’t see how you could have climbed over the wall!”
Nervous laughter followed this sally, because everyone knew there were bells tied along the wall to discourage amorous young folk from climbing over to seek satisfaction at an inappropriate time of night. The Merciless One offered her favors freely, but on her own terms.
Their visitor remained silent. After Walla’s outburst, none of the temple folk spoke. They waited, glancing at intervals toward the sky as if expecting the wind to wash him away. The moon rode high, but it was the many lamps and lanterns brought into the courtyard that illuminated him most clearly. He was a man beyond his prime but not yet elderly. He held a stout staff in his right hand, but he did not need it to lean on because he was so obviously a vigorous, healthy individual. Dressed in the manner of an envoy of Ilu, he wore exceptionally gaudy colors: a voluminous cloak of peacock blue, wine-red pantaloons, and a tunic dyed the intense yellow gotten only from cloth dyed with saffron.
At length, the Hieros appeared on the veranda. She was pinning back her white hair and looking truly irritated, although it could be said that she usually looked that way. When her hair was fixed back with two polished sticks, she strode into the courtyard and halted a prudent distance from the intruder.
“It is late, uncle. Here on the eve of the Ghost Festival that separates the years, we do not accept worshipers, as I’m sure you know.”
He smiled amiably. His voice was clear and courteous and so pleasant that everyone there smiled to hear his apology.
“I am sorry to disturb you. I am not here to worship the Merciless One.”
The old woman, as always, was immune to any person’s charm. “Then what do you want?” she snapped.
He had a friendly grin, yet there was a
quality in his face that made a few of the hierodules shudder and others gasp and feel suddenly like succumbing to tears. Even the ginnies, hiding in the shadows, made their lizard bows as to authority. Even the Hieros, most merciless of all except for the goddess Herself, took a step back, although he made no threatening move and spoke in the mildest voice imaginable.
“You have something I’ve been looking for, for a very long time. I’ve come to get it.”
The wind sighed through the garden foliage.
She turned to her deputies. “Go and get her,” she said in a low voice.
They hurried away with scarcely any noise, for they were trained to move about soundlessly.
“The treasure is mine,” she said to the man. “I paid for it, a fair exchange.”
“You cannot buy what this is,” he said kindly, “and I am sorry if it came into your hands in any manner which led you to believe you could own it.”
“Who are you?” she asked.
He raised both hands in the opening gesture of the talking line. “My nose is itching,” he said. “Many whispers have tickled my ears these last few nights. Listen!”
Acknowledging his right to speak, they listened.
“This is my tale. It is one you all know.”
“Go on,” said the Hieros, but now she seemed afraid, and all those who lived under her care and her rule found that her fear rang like a bell whose resonance made their own fears tremble and wake.
He told the story, punctuated by the most basic of gestures, enough to suggest the tale’s outlines.
“Long ago, in the time of chaos, a bitter series of wars, feuds, and reprisals denuded the countryside and impoverished the lords and guildsmen and farmers and artisans of the Hundred. In the worst of days, an orphaned girl knelt at the shore of the lake sacred to the gods and prayed that peace might return to her land.
“A blinding light split the air, and out of the holy island rising in the center of the lake appeared the seven gods in their own presence. The waters boiled, and the sky wept fire, as the gods crossed over the water to the shore where the girl had fallen.
