by Diana Rivers
Now more women stood up quickly, one after the other, while other women echoed their words with cries and moans and wails. “Let the Hadra have it. I must have some peace in my home. What use is this place to us?” “This has become a killing ground and the Goddess has abandoned us.” “What use is a war that cannot stay won?” “My old father died in my arms with blood bubbling on his lips. I ask you, what harm had he ever done to anyone? What had he ever done besides be a good man and a kind man and a wise voice in the village?” “Before this last round of fighting started, I had three children. Now two of them are dead and one is blind. Tell me, warriors, what kind of glory can I find in your war?” Now the moaning and keening were louder. Women were shouting, “Yes! Yes! Enough! No more!” Every time men tried to interrupt, Lorren or one of the other Wanderers would say, “Wait, they have not finished yet, and you are pledged to listen.” When one man grabbed angrily for his wife, Bathrani stepped quickly between them and several women shouted, “Shame! Shame!”
Finally, there was a long moment of silence, as if this part were done. The women were looking at each other, waiting for a signal to end, when one last woman stood up. She was of startling appearance, very tall for a Kourmairi and with skin no darker than a Muinyairin. That in itself was not so strange, for though the Shokarn have contempt for us, they also mix with us, as is the way with men. It was her deep red hair—darker than potter red, a straight, bright, shimmering fall of bronze—that caught the eye and made her so noticeable. It was also her extraordinary beauty.
She stood up to her full height, with none of that slight stoop at the shoulders that so many Kourmairi women have. If someone had said this was the Goddess Herself in earthly form, I could easily have believed it. At that moment, I might even have been tempted to throw myself at her feet, begging for help and guidance. But in spite of her appearance, this woman was all too human. Though she was tightly controlled, still I could feel waves of pain and anger emanating from her. When she spoke, a quaver of passion resonated in her voice.
“I, Yolande, renounce the Koormir and will return to the Wanderers if they will have me. You have been my people since I was two years of age, but there is nothing left to hold me among you. My old foster mother is long dead. My daughter, Eirilyne, was killed in your fighting. Like Denairi, I had the rare luck to marry a man I loved and who loved me in return. He is dead now, a gentle, caring man who was killed trying to make peace among you. You called him a coward because he would not fight, but he was the bravest man I ever knew. Now he is gone, and for what? There is no man among you I could be with. You all have his blood on your hands. I say give this land to the Hadra. They cannot do worse than you have done.”
Then she turned and fastened the intense stare of her gray-green eyes on Lorren. “I hope you, at least, are an honorable man with no blood on your hands. I need to find someone I can trust who is not a killer.” Then I heard her inner words as clearly as if she had spoken aloud, These Hadra are too strange for me.
At the same moment, I saw Lorren’s stricken face as he blushed deeply and turned away. Would that it were so, I heard him say in his head.
When Yolande sat down again, there was a loud groan from among the women and several voices called out, “Stay with us, Yolande.” “Do not leave us.” “We are your family, your sisters.”
At last it seemed as if all who wished to had spoken. Not one woman had wanted to exact vengeance or to continue the fighting. Finally, after a tense silence, Olna stood up, saying, “If all the women have had their say, we should…”
“Wait!” One more woman stood up. There were gasps of surprise. She was Norn’s wife, Segna, wrinkled and bent, almost as old as Tenairis. “Those who know me know it is not my way to speak in public places, but now I feel I have no choice. Listen with care, for I will not say this again. If the fighting does not stop, I will turn my back on this place and on all of you. I will walk away into the desert, to live alone there or to die, but I will not live among you anymore. I will not be part of this killing one more day. Look around you, Kourmairi, those of Zelandria and Indaran both. If you can sit in a circle and talk with no sword raised, then you can sit in a circle and make peace. Now I have said what I need to say and I am done.” She gave a nod to the circle and sat down abruptly. No other women rose to speak. There was a long, shocked silence, even among the men.
It was over. The women had been given their say. Finally, Friana stood up, still with her baby in her arms. As she rose she began to sing in a sweet, clear voice. It was an old lullaby my mother had sung to me:
Safe in your mother’s arms,
Soft as a dove,
Sleep, my sweet baby,
In comfort and love.
One by one, the other women rose and joined in the singing. They did not go in single file this time but walked out together with the two clans intermixed, the old ones leaning on the younger ones, all singing that lovely lullaby. Gradually the Hadra joined in. Together our voices rose and fell, swelled and diminished, women’s voices weaving over and through each other until it was one great sound like the sighing and moaning of the sea. The old stone walls of the ruined shelter above us seemed to echo with our song.
At last Norn stood up and said wearily, “Let it be as my woman says. I have never heard her speak before on such matters. Let it be as she says. She has shaken me to my soul.” He was shaking his head as he sat back down. Almost as if to himself, he added, “I thought all the games had been played out long ago. Perhaps, after all, there is something new in this world.”
With rage contorting his face, Garrell leapt to his feet, shouting, “You killed my father, old man! Do you expect me to forget that so easily?”
“And you killed my son, with all his bright shining life ahead of him. I will never forget it, not as long as I live. But will it bring him back if I kill you? Will your mother’s tears ease my heart?” Norn was shaking his head again. “Oh, how I am weary of all this. Garrell, we are being offered an honorable way to end this feud between us. I say let us take it while we can. We may not get another chance. Besides, our women are rebelling. They are telling us that if we keep on fighting, we do so alone.”
Garrell spit with contempt. “Will you let women’s words lead you like some snot-nosed child?”
“I have already answered, let it be as my woman says. You had better heed your own wife’s words before some greater sorrow comes to you from this.”
Suddenly, Lorren’s voice was heard above the others. “Tell us, Garrell, which will it be, peace this day or will you go on killing each other till none of you are left?”
At almost the same moment, Friana called out, “Garrell, please…I meant every word I said.”
Garrell was surrounded by a group of young men, the same ones we had encountered with him on the road the day before. Some of them were muttering angrily and one leaned toward him and said with contempt, “Will you let your will be bent by this cowardly Shokarn traitor in the guise of a Wanderer? He has lost his own battle and been disgraced, stripped of rank and uniform by his people. Now he has come crawling here to us with his plots and his plans. Why should we listen to him?”
Lorren did not flush with anger as I expected him to, but before Garrell could respond he asked quickly, “Garrell, if you have a better plan, say it now and we will all listen.”
Garrell muttered and mumbled, looking down at his feet, shifting from one to the other. At last he said sullenly, “I am used to doing, not to speaking. No, I have no better plan. Let it be as the women say. Let the Hadra have this land. It is already soaked with our blood.”
“Done,” Norn answered instantly. “I will take my people north, to the next fork on the Escuro if you will take yours south to the next bay on the coast.”
Then Lorren called out, “Is there any man here who speaks to continue this old war?” Though the young men around Garrell shifted about and glowered at Lorren, none stepped forward or spoke up. “Good,” Lorren went on after a pause.
“You should both shake hands on this and make a pledge besides. Then you, Garrell, need to take your hotheaded young men away with you. There must be no reprisals, no raids, no killings. You and Norn are each responsible for that on your honor and will have to punish any who break the pledge. Your men should not meet or mingle together in any way during this next year. Let messages be carried by your women or by the Hadra. Let any trading be done by them or by the Wanderers. Then, in a year, if there has been no killing and no breaking of the pledge, you can meet together, some trading can resume, and we can begin to see what can be mended out of all this horror.”
The Wanderer Conath stepped forward to say, “Before we are done here, Garrell and Norn, you both must bring your swords before the Hadra and pledge your peace to them in the style of your people.”
Looking solemn and very tired, Norn stepped up to retrieve his sword from the pile of weapons. When he stepped back, Garrell came forward with a scowl to hunt for his. After they were both armed, they stood there awkwardly, staring at each other. Suddenly Alyeeta emerged from the crowd. She swung her pointing fingers around at all the men, ending with Norn and Garrell. “You had best mean what you say and remember to abide by it, for there are strong spells here to bind you and much ill luck for any who does not keep his word.” She had been so silent through all this that I had almost forgotten her presence and was amazed to hear her now. I felt a little shiver of fear go through the crowd like a sharp cold breeze passing over hot skin.
Norn turned toward her, bowed his head slightly, and held out his sword as if to lay it down before Alyeeta. “Lady, I would be only too glad to end…”
“Make no pledges to me, old man,” Alyeeta said quickly, taking a step back. “I am a Witch, not a Hadra. If you wish to make pledges of peace, make them to the future, not the past. Pledge to her,” she said, pointing at me. “She is the one who brought us here. This land speaks to her more than to any of the rest of us. It speaks to her even in her dreams. Pledge to her and through her, to the Hadra. And also pledge that peace to each other.”
This seemed more weight than I could bear. I felt suddenly confused and uncertain and terribly young. Wanting to go look for Pell, I started to shake my head. Alyeeta gave me a look that fastened me to the spot. Then, in that commanding voice of hers, she said, “Step forward, Tazmirrel of Nemanthi. These men have serious business with you. All of us will be witness to their words.” I stepped forward, trying to control my shaking knees. I told myself to stand tall, as I had seen Yolande do. I tried to keep in mind Bathrani’s straight, proud form.
Norn hesitated. He might rather make obeisance to a woman grown old in wisdom than be forced to make it to such a young one. I watched him gather himself, all of his strength and all of his dignity. At last he bowed to me. “Khal Hadera Lossien,” he intoned solemnly. His voice thundered out in the clearing. Perhaps it was easier for this proud old man to make his pledge of peace to what sounded like a great and powerful people rather than to a green girl of hardly nineteen years. For me, it was certainly easier to accept for the Khal Hadera Lossien than in my own name. “We Kourmairi pledge to fight no more in this place,” Norn went on. “We promise you peace here, and we will help protect it. May these hills, this river, and this bay be your home from now on and become your city in the future. On this promise, I give you my hand and my sword.” With those words, he held out his sword to me. I took it with trembling hands. Then he stepped back and looked expectantly toward Garrell.
Garrell stood staring off into the distance. He was silent for so long I thought he meant to withdraw his pledge. Then, not to be outdone, he suddenly held out his sword to me, saying quickly, “Hadra, I pledge you peace in this place, a peace we promise not to break, a peace we will help maintain even against the Zarns’ armies, if need be. I and all my people pledge you this. Let there be no more Kourmairi blood shed in this place.” The words themselves were fine, but I sensed his grudging consent, felt the bitterness in his heart. In his head I heard him say, Only because I must. Only because I have no choices left to me. At that moment, I could almost feel sorry for him.
As I stood looking down at those two swords in my hands, swords that had taken many lives, I tried to think what this meant for me and for my people and for our future. Suddenly there were tears running down my face. Without even giving it thought, I said, “And in return we pledge you our help in keeping this land safe from the Zarns.” It was not for myself or in my own name that I accepted those swords, nor even for the Hadra who were with me that day, but for others in the future, for what would be built here, for what we could not yet see or know. For that I accepted their pledges.
Somehow I trusted Norn, with his hard, old pride and his obvious grieving; somehow I understood him. Garrell I could not read so well. I saw a mix of things in him that did not sit easy with each other, that, in fact, quarreled and shifted about, so that I could not be sure who I was speaking to. Just as I was thinking that, one of the young men who were Garrell’s followers leaned forward and said some words in his ear. He straightened and his expression changed. Looking directly at me, he said, “If you are to live between us in this way, we must come to some understandings. You must not be a corrupting influence on our women. Any Kourmairi woman who leaves her man for your settlement must be honorably returned to us.” There were cries of outrage from the Kourmairi women, shouts from the Hadra, and muttered agreement from the men, even those on opposing sides.
I was caught off guard, so flooded with anger as to be rendered speechless. Pell, who had kept her distance from the whole procedure, suddenly sprang into place beside me. With a slight smile and no show of anger at all, she said, “Thank you, Garrell, for pointing out this flaw in our agreements. Pledges of peace have been made, but clearly, we have more to speak of, if we are to be good neighbors. Things have changed with the freeing of Mishghall by the Hadra. Just as the Shokarn can no longer lord it over the Koormir, so men can no longer lord it over their women. Your women must be free to come and go, just as you are. If any of them wishes to live among us, she should be allowed to do so. We could no more return an unwilling woman than you could return a Kourmairi slave to the Shokarn master. I could not, if my life depended on it, force a woman to go back against her will, nor could any Hadra. That must be understood between us if there is ever to be peace here.”
Garrell’s rage was barely held in check. “Then this is not a valid pledge. I would never have agreed to such a condition.”
Lorren was nodding as if accepting the truth of this. “Do you wish to go back on your pledge, Garrell? If so, we must call the women back and begin again.”
The look of fury on Garrell’s face chilled my heart, but he said quickly, “No, let it stand as it is. Enough of all this talk. I will take my people and go south.”
Norn nodded. “And I will take mine and go north up the river. Perhaps when we meet again, we can talk of trading and crops and weather instead of making war on each other.”
The two groups began rapidly loading their horses and wagons and moving out. Lorren beckoned to me. I followed him up to the old ruin. From there, we could look down on the scene of departure. We watched for a while in silence, standing so close together I could hear his breathing. I was in a turmoil of feelings: joy that the meeting was finally over and the land safely ours; grief for all the suffering and death that had made this possible. Suddenly Lorren turned to face me. “Well, Tazzil, we have won a great victory today, you and I, and no one has been vanquished. That is the kind of victory I like.”
I saw in my mind Garrell’s sullen, angry face and was not quite so sure. “Were you not angry at what Garrell’s man said of you?”
“Why should I be angry? It was all the truth. Everything that man said was true, only he and I have a different view of it. He sees it as a disgrace. I see it as the lifting of a great burden. It is true that if you count the Zarn as my master, then I am indeed a traitor. I threw away that battle and will fight no other for him. A
nd yes, I have been stripped of rank and uniform and all else the Zarn and his followers think worthwhile. For me, it is a blessing. If only I had my books here. That is the one thing I miss, the one thing I valued from all that. Poor Garrell. He muttered and mumbled and made resistance, and in the end he said what we needed him to say. How can I be angry at him or any of his men? I got exactly what I came for.”
I laughed, suddenly understanding. All through the meeting, I had thought that Lorren had no power or control, that he had simply let it follow its own course. Now I understood that he had been the dance master. We had all danced to the steps he had designed. From the very start, he had held to a plan. Every step had moved in us in that direction, though not always in a straight line.
“You will have much clearing to do here,” he said, gesturing around with his hand. “It might have been well to ask them to stay and clear up their own rubble, but they are still too new to the ways of peace. They need some time to forget their quarrels.”
“And perhaps we can make use of some of it. This, for instance, this would be a fine building, with the walls topped and the roof repaired.” Suddenly, I was looking out of a window at a vast, colorful gathering in the meeting field. It was almost like an Essu. There were ships on the water and I could hear the sounds of music and laughter. I could not tell if it was the future I was looking into or the past. In the next moment, I was once again standing beside Lorren in that long-abandoned ruin of stone.
“Lorren, tell me again why you offered us this place. Tell me so I can really comprehend it.”
“For many reasons, but to begin with, you must understand that I did not offer it to you. It was not mine to offer. I only asked you to come and see it. In the first place, because the Koormir could not surrender it to each other. No good could come of their being here, only more bloodshed and killing. Neither side could hold it long. They needed a buffer to keep them from doing the work of the Zarn’s guards and destroying themselves. A few Wanderers coming and going could not make a lasting peace. And in the second place, because I love this place in ways I cannot explain to you or even to myself. I wanted to see it well settled and even loved. And in the third place, and perhaps most important of all, because I wanted to see the Hadra settled in some safe place where you could flourish and become whatever it is you are meant to be. You have work to do in this world that I barely comprehend and you, yourselves, are only starting to understand.”
