The Myst Reader

by Rand; Robyn Miller; David Wingrove

  He paused, a snarl on his features now. “The truth is this. We know what the Terahnee are. The scars on our bodies tell us. So, too, the chains in our heads. Gat speaks of learning to use our eyes. He is right. But first we must see the threat the Terahnee still pose. Gat says we are free, but we are not free. Not until the last Terahnee child is dead.”

  There was a murmur from the gathering at that—both shocked surprise and vehement agreement. And Atrus, hearing it and looking about him, understood at once. Whatever Gat had said about learning to be themselves, this was the single issue that divided the relyimah.

  Ymur spoke on, a cold vehemence in his words now; their former anger transformed into a chilling certainty.

  “If any of you still doubt, look back. Remember what was done to you. Not once or twice, but every day for all your lives. Unseen we were. Well, I for one will pluck their eyes from their heads!”

  And with that he turned and strode into the darkness, leaving behind him a crowd that now seethed and murmured, like a great soup that had been brought almost to the boil.

  “May I speak?”

  Baddu had stepped forward, meaning to address the gathering. Now he turned, looking to the speaker. It was Eedrah.

  “Eedrah?” Baddu said, surprised and perhaps embarrassed after what had just been said.

  “Let him speak,” Gat said from the darkness. “Unless Ymur wishes to pluck out the eyes of one who is our friend.”

  There was fierce murmuring at that. Baddu looked down, then nodded.

  “Thank you,” Eedrah said, stepping to the front of the platform. He looked about him, clearly nervous, then began, his eyes pleading for the relyimah to listen.

  “Ymur is right. My people do not deserve to live. They were cruel and self-obsessed. No words of mine can wash away the shame I feel.” He turned, looking to Gat. “Indeed, I would give my own eyes were it to help.”

  He turned back. “And Ymur is right about one other thing. Were enough Terahnee to survive, they would surely try to make things as they were. For they know no different, and even this great tragedy, this judgment as it seems, will not make them see. Which is to say, I understand you, Ymur. I cannot feel precisely what you feel, for I have not suffered as you have suffered, yet I can imagine how it feels. And, imagining it, I can understand the desire for vengeance that burns in you.”

  Eedrah paused. “I understand it, yet part of me holds out against that path. We have had enough of violence. Enough of kill or be killed. Our way must lie in another direction. Besides, there are more important issues to be debated. How, for instance, are we to feed the relyimah? And how should we direct their energies now that Terahnee has fallen?”

  This was too much for Ymur. Stepping out into the center of the platform, he began to harangue Eedrah.

  “What has that to do with you, Terahnee? We shall feed ourselves, yes, and choose our own leaders. You think to control us with clever words, no doubt, but I for one am not fooled.”

  “A fool is never fooled,” Gat said, walking across to Eedrah’s side. “Or so he claims. But you, Ymur, speak ill of one who has often proved his worth. Eedrah is right. We must think of more than killing. We must consider how our freedom should be used, not just now but in the future also.”

  Ymur bristled. “I say once more. Destroy the Terahnee. Then we can go home.”

  “Home?” Gat shook his head sadly. “Do you not understand, Ymur? This is our home. The question is, what are we to make of it?”

  “You have a plan?” Ymur sneered.

  “Not I,” Gat answered him, “but I understand there is one here who might offer us a way to follow.” Gat turned, looking in Atrus’s direction. “Atrus of D’ni. Would you step forward now and speak to the relyimah?”

  Atrus stepped up, conscious of the watchful yet unwatching crowd surrounding him. Silent they were, like a great army of the dead.

  “What has happened here is a great tragedy,” he began. “Many of your people have died, and many more will die before this scourge has passed. So it was in my own Age of D’ni. Yet no two things are ever quite alike, and D’ni was not Terahnee. This world, which so bewitched me at first sight, I see now was corrupt and wicked. Corrupted to the core by those given the responsibility to lead. As Eedrah said, its makers deserved their fate. But that was not so for D’ni. My world—or I should rightly say, my grandfather’s world—was a world of order and fairness, as unlike to this as the rock is to the air. It was a world of fixed and certain laws, where every man was treated with the respect and dignity he deserved. We had no slaves, no stewards. There were no beatings in our world, no deaths—unless by accident or natural cause. Each man was seen for what he was, and given recognition for his talents.”

  “So you say,” Ymur said, interrupting him. “But I say you made a pact with the Terahnee. I say you meant to bring your people here and settle in Terahnee.”

  Atrus shrugged. “That is true, but…”

  “There!” Ymur said. “What did I say!” Turning away, he went to the edge of the platform. “Well, brothers? Are we to swap one set of masters for another?”

  “This is not mastery!” Atrus exclaimed. “Unless you call it mastery of oneself. I do not wish to rule you, Ymur, just give you guidance.”

  “So you say. But I say that we relyimah will find our own way now. For too long have we listened to others and done what they have told us to do. Now it is our time, and we shall not be bound by masters’ ways.”

  “It is not so!”

  Ymur turned back, his face scornful. “Why should we listen to you, Atrus of D’ni?”

  “Because I have your interests at heart!”

  “Our interests, or yours?”

  Atrus stared at Ymur, understanding suddenly that whatever he said he would not convince this one. Ymur was set against him, set against reason itself. And sadly, Ymur was not the only one, for his fiery words had once more ignited the dark mass of humanity gathered there before them.

  He was about to turn and walk away, to take the books of law he had brought with him from D’ni and go home, when a figure moved past him to stand between himself and Ymur.

  Ymur half-turned, sensing the presence of someone close beside him, then frowned. “Boy?”

  Atrus took a step toward the child then stopped. Uta was trembling, yet there was something about his stance that warned Atrus not to interfere. The child had steeled himself to do this. He was hunched into himself, his head tucked tightly against his chest, yet his voice sounded clearly in the sudden silence.

  “Y-you are…wr-wrong.”

  “Wrong?” Ymur twitched his head back, as if someone had flicked him in the face. And then, unexpectedly, he laughed. “Go away, child. Let the elders speak.”

  “You are wrong,” Uta repeated, no stammer this time. “Atrus is a friend. He found me when I was ill and nursed me. He carried me, not fearing for himself.”

  But Ymur simply sneered. “Only because he knew he could not catch it.”

  “Not then,” Hersha said. “Uta is right. Atrus acted as a brother, not fearing for himself. And his people helped tend our ill.”

  Uta looked up into the old man’s face. Then, in a strange incantatory tone, he said:

  “What ails the sickly child?

  What stranger comes?

  What words will follow him,

  Spoken by sleeping tongues?”

  Utter silence followed the words.

  Atrus turned, sensing that something was happening in the crowd and saw, to his astonishment, that many now were looking at the platform, staring in awe at the child—yes, and at himself, too.

  “What is it?” Atrus asked, looking at Eedrah. “What is going on?” But even Eedrah, it seemed, did not know.

  One by one the relyimah were dropping to their knees, an awed whisper spreading across the great arena.

  Up on the platform, Gat stepped past Atrus and raised his arms. Silence fell.

  “We have heard enough,” he said, his
voice trembled with a strange, inexplicable emotion. “It is decided. We shall learn this new law and embrace new ways. Ymur, is it not so?”

  Atrus looked to Ymur, expecting the man to argue, but Ymur’s head had dropped in defeat. “It is so.”

  §

  As the relyimah dispersed to their encampments, their leaders went through the great arch at the back of the amphitheater and into the Chamber of the Moon.

  Once water had tumbled in huge illuminated curtains from all sides of the great hall, but now those artificial falls were still, the curved surfaces of marble dull and dry. Behind them, glimpsed through the spaces between the bulky segments, twelve huge revolving “scoops”—six massive troughs of stone between two equally massive wheels; troughs that were designed to lift the water from the reservoirs below—sat idle now. The thick ropes trailing from the wheels lay slack, the leather harnesses empty.

  Overhead the moon, a huge shield made of glittering crystal, rested where its last journey across those illusory heavens had brought it, the fierce blue-white light of a powerful lamp shining through it onto the floor a hundred feet below.

  But Atrus barely noticed anything of this. As the great doors closed on them, he turned, looking to the child.

  “Uta…what were those words you spoke just now?”

  Uta, startled by Atrus’s request, glanced at Gat, then tucked his head into his chest.

  “Gat?” Atrus asked, turning to the old man.

  “Those were lines from the Korokh Jimah.”

  “The Book of prophecies?”

  “So it is sometimes known.”

  “Your people seemed to attribute some significance to the words.”

  “Words spoken by sleeping tongues.” Gat smiled. “The D’ni books of law seem to fit that description well, would you not say, Atrus? Not to speak of the ailing child.”

  “Most anything would fit.” Atrus shook his head. “Well, let us move on to more important matters.” He stopped, looking about him at the small group who were gathered there. “Where is Ymur?”

  “Gone,” Hersha said. “I saw him leave.”

  “Ymur is quite hotheaded,” Atrus said. “It might be best to have him watched.”

  “You think him a danger?” Hersha asked.

  “His is a single voice,” Gat answered. “He might be angry, but he will not challenge the word of the relyimah council.”

  “Maybe so, but you need to find a task for him. Something to harness all that anger.”

  “You could be right, Atrus. We shall consider the matter. But tell me…these laws of yours…they can be adapted for the relyimah?”

  Atrus smiled. “I have no doubt of it. Indeed, I shall begin the task at once. But I shall need help copying out the resultant passages. Are there any among the relyimah who could help us in the task?”

  Gat laughed. “Thousands. You think those lazy good-for-nothings, the Terahnee, would lower themselves to undertake such hard and difficult work?”

  “Then I shall have my companions, Oma and Esel, help me make a suitable translation of the laws, to be copied and disseminated.”

  “And we shall appoint those among us who seem suitable to act as teachers of these new laws.” Gat paused. “But there are other, far more pressing problems.”

  “Food,” Hersha said.

  “Food? But food is plentiful.”

  “Now it is. But unless the fields are harvested, the fruit picked from the trees, and the animals tended to, then we shall very quickly have a problem. Since the sickness came, almost nothing has been done.”

  “I see.” Atrus considered a moment. “And the problem is getting them to work again?”

  “Not at all,” Baddu said. “There is a will among the relyimah to work. But many have died, and without the stewards…”

  “Our people feel lost,” Gat said. “Without direction. Oh, they hated and despised their masters, yes, and their masters’ servants, but now that they are gone they find they also needed them.”

  “I understand,” Atrus said, looking to Eedrah, who was strangely silent. “But that need will pass. They must be their own masters now. And we shall help them in that task.” He paused. “Each man knows his work, does he not?”

  “They do.”

  “Then that is what each will do.”

  Gat frowned. “But who will arrange it all?”

  “The relyimah. Eventually. But first they must return to their routines.” Atrus smiled. “I know what you are saying, Gat. They need someone to tell them what to do. But it is not true. Not entirely. They have only to act as if the stewards were still there—but unseen.”

  There was surprise, then laughter at that.

  “You mean, pretend?” Gat asked.

  “Until a better system is devised. Until real changes can be made. But you are right…these basic tasks must be continued, for without them nothing will work.”

  “Then so it will be,” Gat said, a beaming smile lighting his blind face. “But what of the women?”

  “Women?” There was a look of consternation on Atrus’s face. “There are female relyimah?”

  “Of course. Who do you think did most of the work in the great houses?”

  “The men, I thought…”

  He looked to Hersha, who shrugged. “I thought you knew, Atrus. They have their own quarters, far from the men’s quarters.”

  “Segregated, you mean?”

  But the word meant nothing to Hersha.

  Atrus looked about him, seeing things anew. “And the two never meet?”

  “Never,” Gat answered.

  “And now?”

  Gat looked away, embarrassed. “It is…difficult. More difficult than seeing and being seen. To even look at one was an offense for which a male relyimah might die.”

  Atrus grimaced. “I didn’t…”

  “See?” Eedrah said, breaking his long silence. “Oh, it was the worst of it, Atrus. Beside that, all other cruelties were bearable. But to break that bond.” He shuddered. “For that alone I agree with Ymur. If I were relyimah I would hunt my people down until the last of us was dead.”

  “Yourself included, Eedrah?”

  Gat was staring blindly at Eedrah, astonished by the depth of bitterness he had displayed.

  “I was but barely better than my fellows. I did nothing to persuade them they were wrong.”

  “You helped us, Eedrah,” Hersha said, reaching out and actually touching the Terahnee.

  Eedrah stared a moment at the place where Hersha’s hand rested on his arm, then looked about him. Not a face condemned him. He closed his eyes, the pain he was feeling at that moment overwhelming him. “To live such a lie…some days it was unbearable.”

  “I understand,” Gat said. “But now that all is done with, and you, my brother, you must help us find a better way.”

  Eedrah looked at the blind man, then bowed his head. “As you wish…my brother.”

  §

  Back at the great house in Ro’Jethhe, Atrus sat down with Catherine, quickly confiding to her all that had happened at the assembly.

  “There are female relyimah?” she asked, astonished.

  “So they tell me. But Hersha says they are kept separate. Segregated. Apparently they were not even allowed to look at each other. On pain of death. And they are neutered—male and female both—just in case any should escape and hide away.”

  Catherine stared at him, horrified. “This changes everything.”

  “How so?”

  “It’s very simple. You wish to make a proper world of this, a real society, with good laws and fair treatment for all. But how can you create any kind of society when there are no children and no possibility of children?”

  “Then we shall bring them in, from other Ages. Oh, not as the Terahnee brought them in, as slaves, but with their families.”

  “Do you think that will work?”

  “I do not know. Yet we must try.” Atrus sat back, kneading his neck with one hand, tired now after the long
day. “One thing I do know: This is an undertaking far larger than the rebuilding of D’ni ever was. But if the will is here—and I think it is—then we can make it work. And maybe we might settle here, after all. Be part of this.”

  She smiled. “Maybe. But first you ought to send a messenger to Master Tamon, to tell him all is well.”

  “I shall. At once.”

  He stood and turned to go, but Catherine called him back. “Atrus? One other thing. Have you noticed…”

  “Noticed?”

  “Marrim and Eedrah. Have you noticed how they spend time with each other?”

  §

  Marrim poked her head around the door.

  “So there you are. I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”

  Eedrah sat at the desk on the far side of the library, a journal open in front of him. At the sound of her voice he had set his pen down. Now, as Marrim walked across, he sanded the page and closed the journal.

  “Something you don’t want me to see?” she teased, coming up to the desk.

  He looked back at her sullenly, then pushed the journal across the desk to her. “Look, if you want.”

  “No,” she said, realizing she had hurt his feelings. “Are you all right?”

  He looked to one side of her, then shook his head. “No, not really. I feel…” He looked straight at her. “I feel like I oughtn’t to have lived.”

  “It’s what half the D’ni suffer from,” she said brightly. “So Catherine says.” Then, she spoke more seriously. “You don’t really feel like that, do you? I mean, I thought you wanted to help the relyimah.”

  “I do.” Eedrah frowned, then stood up, walking halfway across that massive floor before he turned to look back at her. “Things were said tonight, at the assembly. There was this one relyimah called Ymur. A disagreeable type, yet what he said brought it home to me. How evil it all was. And I felt that I’d permitted it somehow.”