by Glenda Larke
If only. If only.
When Nealrith entered the stormquest room of Breccia Hall, his father was reclining on a divan, propped up by cushions, while Ethelva hovered uncertainly behind her husband, wanting to fuss over a man who loathed fuss. Nealrith concealed a sigh. His mother was still tall and elegant, but her calm had long since become careworn, and the evidence was there in her prematurely white hair and the worry lines of her face. She was a water-blind woman renowned for her common sense, and Nealrith was not used to seeing her so indecisive, but Granthon’s illness had lapped too long at her every thought. She had become prey to doubt, just as Nealrith had, filled with uncertainties about the future of the family and, indeed, the land itself.
Nealrith delivered his assessment of Breccia’s water storage and the tale it told: his father had cut back too much on the size of his storms. Granthon said nothing at the news. His stillness was unnatural, as if he had even forgotten to breathe.
“Father?” Nealrith asked.
The Cloudmaster stirred. His gaze dithered around the room, lingering for a moment on the scroll racks and the rolled documents they contained. The lectern in front of him was spread with the parchment he had been considering when his son had entered the room.
“Father—”
“Open the shutters, Rith.”
“Father, no. You have done too much today already. You can’t drive yourself beyond—”
“Every day that I allow the levels to fall is another day I will not be able to make up.”
That was true, and Nealrith knew it. He took a deep breath and pushed away thoughts of what should have been, of that insidious if only. “If you do too much, you will die, and where will we be then?”
“You have to find a replacement for me.”
“We’ve been looking for as long as I remember.” He concealed his frustration and tried to ease the tightness in his gut. Kaneth was right, damn him; they had to do something other than talk.
His father made a slight movement of his right hand, an opening out, as if he had just taken an unwelcome decision. “There’s one place no one has looked. Two actually, although not even I would think of looking among the ’Basters.”
Nealrith was confused. “In the White Quarter? Of course not! Where, then?”
“The Gibber.”
Nealrith made a gesture of irritation. “A waste of time, surely. From what I’ve heard, there are very few water sensitives, and there’s never been a rainlord or a stormlord from there. You know the saying, ‘Wash a crow with rosewater and it still won’t be pink.’ They are a water-blind people. Worse, they are stupid and ignorant and dirty and dishonest.”
His mother interrupted. “Don’t judge, Rith. Perhaps they are dirty because they don’t have enough water, ignorant because they have never been taught and dishonest because they are so poor. A thirsty man might steal to live.”
“And what about the stupid part?” he asked wryly.
“Perhaps they are stupid merely because you haven’t the wit to see them any other way.”
He had the grace to laugh. “All right, all right. They are not as bad as I think and I displayed a bias that was both unjustified and unworthy of me; you are probably right about that. But that still doesn’t make them water sensitive. They have never paid more than the barest of lip service to the Sunlord and the Watergiver, which might explain it. We would do better to look in the White Quarter; they at least are a pious people who have some water sensitives. Or so I’m told.”
Granthon held up a hand. “We both know that the trouble with the White Quarter is not their sensitivity but their secrecy. We are not welcome there, and who can blame them? They have been spat upon for generations. Anyway, it takes more than sensitivity to make a rainlord, let alone a stormlord. We have more chance among the Gibber folk. At least they look up to the Scarpen. I suspect they would gladly give us their water-talented children.”
“Fools,” Nealrith muttered, but the remark said as much about his opinion of his own quadrant as it did about the people from the Gibber.
“I want you to go there,” Granthon said. “A quest to find a potential stormlord. I want you to run the tests in every Gibber settle on the plains. Take Iani with you. It will give him something to focus his mind on.”
Nealrith was appalled. “You want two rainlords out searching the Gibber? Why? Anyone can conduct the tests for water sensitivity. It doesn’t need a rainlord!” And I have a city to run.
“I may not be much of a storm gatherer nowadays, Nealrith, but I am still in full command of my senses.”
“You must have a reason.”
“Other than desperation? Yes, two, in fact. My passion for our land’s history has rendered up a reward. A name and a place. I didn’t do the actual research work; I passed that to Ryka Feldspar. She has a scholar’s mind.” He smiled at Ethelva. “I wonder sometimes if we don’t underestimate our women, Nealrith. She found that one of my predecessors—from a very long time ago—bore a name that sounds as if it came from the Gibber. Gypsum Miner of Wash Drybarrow.”
Nealrith stared, speechless.
“The long history of mining in the Gibber means they have more family names related to that ancient occupation than we do,” his father continued. “Their constant fossicking has led them to use minerals and rocks as personal names all the time. And ‘wash’ is the Gibber word for dry riverbed, what we’d call a gully.”
Nealrith was impatient. “Wash Drybarrow is an actual Gibber settle?”
“Well, Ryka found a Wash Dribarra, which has a settle. After that, I sent some of my people out to talk to Gibber folk down on Level Forty.”
He was intrigued in spite of himself. “What did they find out?”
“Gibber reeves manage matters pertaining to water. However, unlike our reeves, who must have water skills, they usually have none. There are occasional water sensitives among Gibber folk, but they are regarded as potential water thieves. As a consequence, a child exhibiting water sensitivity usually has the tendency beaten out of him.”
Ethelva gave an unladylike snort. “Or rather, they have the tendency to admit to it beaten out of them.”
“Exactly. Rith, I want rainlords testing in the Gibber because I don’t want the slightest chance that a water sensitive child, or an adult for that matter, is missed. I want more than standard tests. I want you to hunt for any sign of people there who may be hiding their talent deliberately.”
Nealrith considered that. “I suppose it doesn’t make sense that there should be water sensitives here but not in the Gibber. We are supposed to have had the same origins.”
“Even Reduner sandmasters and tribemasters have some talent with water,” Ethelva said, “and they aren’t supposed to be related to us at all.”
Granthon nodded. “We have searched the Red Quarter and the Scarpen—scoured them, more like—for the past twenty-five years, and found nothing. Think, Rith. The three new talents we identified in that time, we found right here at home. Your daughter Senya, Iani’s Lyneth, and Ryka Feldspar. Ryka may be the daughter of a rainlord, but her power is weak. And Senya looks to be no better. Lyneth, now—but we all know what happened to Lyneth.”
He fell silent, and Ethelva squeezed his hand. Even Nealrith was discomforted by the memory. How could he forget? She had been the hope of the Quartern, Iani’s lovely six-year-old daughter. Dark-eyed and dimpled and plump, she had charmed them all with her lively inquisitiveness, her mischievous charm. And she’d been stormlord-talented. Then one day some fifteen years past, on a routine journey with her parents to attend a family wedding in another Scarpen city, she had wandered off into the desert. Nealrith felt sick about it even now. They had never found her body, and her father had never recovered from the shock. Iani the Sandcrazy—he had blamed himself because he was the rainlord of the group; he should at least have been able to follow the trace of her water.
Granthon stirred restlessly. “Only three children in almost thirty years—and we didn’t
even have to look for them, as they were all born to rainlords. What harm can it do to search the Gibber?”
“Father, it’ll take a year or more! What about my duties here?”
“They can be shared by the city’s other rainlords. This is important.” Granthon lay back, fumbling for the support of the cushions. “Let’s just say that we found a child in the Scarpen or the Red Quarter who has the potential to be a stormlord. It would be many more years before they would be skilled enough to help me.” He gave a sick smile. “By that time we could all have died of thirst. On the other hand, if you find someone in the Gibber, they could perhaps be older and closer to attaining their full powers.”
Nealrith grimaced. “I once had my purse cut by a waterless Gibberman, and I’ve seen how they live down on the last level. Hovels, reeking with vermin. And you should hear what caravanners say about travelling through the Gibber itself. They have to pay outrageous taxes just for passing through, whether they take water or not. If they don’t pay up, they risk getting raided. Murdered even. Is that the kind of person we want as a new stormlord?”
“You are not usually so quick to judge!” his mother snapped. “Every pot is black on the bottom. They are not the only ones with a dark underside. There will be many good folk among them, too.”
He forced a smile. “I’ll try to remember that.”
“Do so,” she said with some asperity. “If there are ills on Level Forty, then ask yourself if that is not the fault of the city’s ruler.” Before he could retort, she added, “Perhaps the two of you should ask yourselves this: Why do we lack talented children all of a sudden?”
“What do you mean?” Nealrith asked, still smarting from her implied criticism of his rule.
“Just that. Never before has the Quartern been short of stormlords, let alone rainlords. Perhaps we should be looking for the reason.”
It was Granthon who answered. “There’s nothing so unusual in going for a time with so few stormlords born. My study of history has taught me that much. It will change; it always does. In the past it never mattered much if there was a gap in births, because there were enough older rainlords or stormlords to manage until a new generation came along. It’s just that this time we have been unlucky. We lost a lot of young, talented people.”
Nealrith nodded. He’d numbered good friends among them.
“Two were probable stormlords and the others were possibles. Such a tragedy. Iani’s Lyneth was just the last,” Granthon said.
“Garouth called the deaths an unnatural coincidence,” Ethelva said thoughtfully, then reminded Nealrith, “Your grandfather put all you younger rainlords—those who might have developed into stormlords—under guard after that.”
“Unnatural? They were just unfortunate accidents and illnesses,” Granthon said, but his protest was hesitant, as if he doubted its truth. “Two disappeared during a spindevil windstorm, I remember. We nearly lost Taquar Sardonyx then, too.” He shook his head sadly. “I had high hopes of Taquar. I thought he might just make a stormlord. He came so close, but never had quite enough pull. I wondered if what he suffered in the sandstorm might not have been the reason he lost the edge a stormlord needs. So close, so close, and he took it badly.”
He shifted position, trying to get comfortable. “He offered me his aid recently, you know. He added his strength to mine, to see if it helped me.”
Nealrith tried to quell the jealousy that raged through him at the thought. It should have been me. But then, what would have been the point? They both knew the limitations of Nealrith’s rainlord skills.
“No, I didn’t know. When was this?” he asked.
Ethelva came to rearrange the cushions at Granthon’s back as he elaborated. “Last year when you were out inspecting the tunnels. I tried to teach him the knack of gathering a cloud out of the sea.” He sighed. “He is stronger than you, certainly, but not as strong as I hoped. He had nothing to lend me that would make any difference.”
“Oh. He wouldn’t have been holding back deliberately, would he?”
His father lashed out with a hint of his old energy. “That suggestion is unworthy of you! And ridiculous.”
Nealrith flushed. “Perhaps. Father, there’s something you should know. Kaneth and, I suspect, Taquar, and maybe others as well, are saying that we should abandon the ’Basters and the Gibber folk. That you should bring rain only to the Red and Scarpen Quarters.”
To his surprise, his father said merely, “Ah yes. Taquar mentioned that to me. Several years back, when it became clear that we were not going to find any more stormlords in a hurry. He regards both quarters as expendable. In a way, he is right. We don’t need them for our survival. We’d be short of resin and salt and soda and some minerals, but we’d survive.” He looked up at his son. “So he’s persuaded Kaneth to his point of view, has he?”
“It’s an… an evil idea. How can they even consider—”
“Nealrith, don’t be a fool. This is exactly the sort of thing we may have to consider. I will have to decide soon which areas must get no rain at all so that I have the strength to bring rain elsewhere. Would you rather we die first?”
Nealrith stared at his father in horror.
“Ah, I see. You would have us all go down together, so that no one survives at all?”
“I can’t believe you would—”
“Believe it!” his father growled in another display of his old strength. “Stop dreaming, Nealrith. Even if you find a potential stormlord or two in the Gibber Quarter, we may have to let whole parts of the Quartern die. There won’t be a choice. My disagreement with Taquar is over when to do it, not whether to do it. He wants me to conserve my energies as long as possible by cutting down on cloudmaking. It’s a wise strategy; I’m just not quite desperate enough to do it yet. But if you fail in the Gibber Quarter, then yes, I will withhold rainstorms from that whole Quarter. And the White Quarter, too.”
For a moment Nealrith stood, immobile, the blood drained from his face. Ethelva came and laid a hand on his arm. He turned to look at her and saw the acquiescence there, written in her eyes. His horror deepened, choking off thought. His mother could believe such a solution was necessary?
“Do as your father asked, dear. Open the shutters.”
He strove for coherence. “Sandblighted eyes, Mother, he—”
“Nealrith, just do it.”
He made a gesture of negation but threw open the shutters anyway. Light blasted in on a wave of dry heat, both so intense he winced.
Granthon did not bother to look down at the slopes of the city below; instead he squinted towards the horizon and waited for his eyes to adjust. Nealrith knew he was already assessing the distant water in the air, far beyond a mere rainlord’s perception.
“The conditions are good,” he said. “Can you see, Nealrith?”
It took a moment, but then he could indeed see wispy clouds dissolving and coalescing above where the Giving Sea bordered the southern limits of the Quartern. Not many, but enough to make Granthon’s stormquest easier.
“Yes,” Nealrith said heavily. If only I could help! Guilt rippled through him. Irrational, he knew. It wasn’t his fault that he was no more than an average rainlord. Watergiver knew he tried.
Then his father’s focus was gone from him, turned inwards, pushed outwards, whatever it was that he did at moments like this, with whatever power he possessed. Nealrith gazed at the cloud over the sea and tried to imagine that he could see the changes his father wrought, the gathering of water, the building of the dark storm clouds packed with the potential of life-giving rain.
For a long while there was nothing; then the storm clouds were there, growing larger and darker by the moment. Time passed; a servant entered the room twice to upend the sandglass. The clouds moved away from the sea, rose higher, slowly shifted closer across the Skirtings.
His father lay, propped up on the divan at the window, bathed in sweat. Giving up his own water in the effort. His own life seeping away as he reached
the limits of his power. His skin was pale, his breathing shallow; his body shivered.
Nealrith shot a look at his mother, knowing he could not keep his fear out of the glance.
“Yes, it is too much,” she whispered, the words soft, her voice resigned. “It was too soon. One day he will not come back.” She held her son’s gaze. “One day there will be one stormquest too many.”
He tried to swallow, but his mouth was dry. “Could it be… today?”
“No, no, not yet. A year, two… who knows? Lord Gold makes sacrifices, the Sun Temple worshippers pray for him, the High Physician doses him; perhaps one of them will find the miracle they seek. We all do what we can. I no longer grow flowers. I bathe infrequently. I don’t give my clothes to be washed so often.”
He looked back at the clouds. They would bypass the city to the east, and they moved as if they rode winds across the sky. He knew there were no winds; there never were. Nothing except the force a stormlord sent from himself. All being well, soon they would reach the Warthago Range and be forced to rise and drop their rain.
Priests explained all water-power by saying the Sunlord had gifted it to his believers in order to mitigate the ferocity of his radiance. That made sense to Nealrith. A god by his very nature must always overwhelm, and water-power evened up the balance. What puzzled him was why the Sunlord had not helped as the stormlords disappeared one by one from the Quartern. Why had he not ensured the birth of others?
I mustn’t question, he thought. The Sunlord knows best and the priests say we must accept his will. Everything happens for a reason.
He looked back at his father, the last stormlord in the land. He wanted to help him, yet he knew in his heart he was glad he didn’t have to give up so much of himself to keep others alive. He was glad his whole life was not governed by the quest for storms. Still, he would have done it to help his father, to prevent the Cloudmaster’s life seeping away from him, his strength draining drop by precious drop.
And then Granthon cried out, a heart-rending cry of pain and outrage and despair.
