Ten Crescent Moons (Moonquest)

by Marilyn Haddrill

  As Adalginza gazed down at tea leaves in the steaming, hot liquid, she wondered what she should say this time that would cause the least damage.

  Since her impromptu marriage to Captain Kalos in the wilderness more than a full season ago, she had lost far too much weight. Her appetite was practically non-existent and she could no longer remember the last time she had felt any real joy.

  And it was all because of forced meetings like this one.

  "Adalginza?" Benfaaro promoted, this time more sternly.

  "Please. Give me a moment to warm my hands and collect my thoughts."

  It would be much easier to fill this role if Adalginza had discovered during the early days of her marriage that Captain Kalos was unworthy of affection. She had in some ways hoped to be disappointed in him. But quite the opposite had occurred.

  She grew to love Captain Kalos deeply. And with each passing moment, she respected him still more.

  He, on the other hand, had no idea of the treachery she was committing as his trusted wife. If he ever found out, she knew that the goodness within him that she so loved might be forever destroyed.

  And she would be to blame.

  Yet, the fate of her own people depended on the information she routinely provided to Benfaaro, passed along through couriers she met with in secret near Sola Re.

  Most of the information she provided involved the movements of Crescent House caravans transporting more settlers deep into the interior of the frontier. These people were like swarms of ants, as they debarked from the steady influx of ships sent from the Prime Continent.

  They had no respect for the tribes they were displacing. But in the subsequent ambushes of these caravans, many of those killed were innocent women and children. They were on their way to join the men who had already arrived at remote frontier settlements to serve as Crescent knights, farmers, merchants, miners, trappers, and hunters.

  It was true that those from the Crescent Houses did not hesitate to slaughter her own people if they dared to resist while they were being pushed out of traditional homelands.

  Yet, the guilt of what she was doing sometimes seemed more than Adalginza could bear. She had no easy answers, and no idea anymore of exactly what was right or wrong.

  She looked down at her hands gripping the cup, and imagined that they seemed bloodied in the red reflection of the firelight.

  "You look ill." Benfaaro sounded unusually concerned. "More so each time I see you."

  He turned and gave Bruna an accusing look.

  "I have done nothing!" Bruna protested. "How could I poison her? I have been gone from Adalginza's presence for more than a full season."

  "Then give her something that will make her better. We must have the information she provides us."

  Bruna stared for a long time at Adalginza, assessing her.

  "No herb or potion will heal what troubles her. It is all in her mind. And it is her mind that makes her body so ill."

  Adalginza laughed without humor.

  "Captain Kalos, too, believes that you poisoned me, Bruna."

  Bruna looked genuinely indignant. "I tell you, I did not! I swear by every saint of every tribe of all our ancestors, I did not. Why would I?"

  "There are other ways to poison people." Adalginza regarded her with distaste. "You know full well that your very existence is toxic to those around you."

  Bruna jumped to her feet and turned to Benfaaro.

  "How dare you allow her to address me in this way? As though I were the enemy?"

  Benfaaro merely shrugged his shoulders and allowed them to sag forward. He stared into the fire, and took a sip of his tea, as though no longer hearing the words around him.

  Bruna regarded him with open disgust.

  "If Talan were here, he would strike Adalginza for showing me such disrespect."

  "Perhaps it is Talan you should have wedded." Benfaaro now spoke in a dangerous monotone.

  "What an absurd idea. Talan is not Of The Blood."

  Benfaaro's eyes now seemed menacing, as he perused his wife.

  "I have no illusions left about why you chose me. There is no love in you. But did you ever consider that all the power you have now dies when I die? What will you do then?"

  "If you die, Adalginza will marry Talan." Bruna smiled at him, taunting. "And Talan will do as I say."

  Benfaaro's eyes shifted to his sister.

  "I see," he said, without emotion. "So you do have your reasons for keeping Adalginza alive. I should have recognized this long ago. It would have spared me much worry on my sister's behalf."

  "But I far prefer to see you strong and healthy and long-lived, dear husband," Bruna said with exaggerated, false sweetness.

  "I believe that as well. Otherwise, I would be dead already. At your hands."

  Benfaaro took another casual sip of his tea, as though they were discussing whether the next day would dawn cloudy or sunny.

  "I have lived with your hate so long now," he said. "I almost imagine I hear your darkest and most private thoughts. It is as though you are more demon than person, always haunting me. There is something about you. And something about this place of death, this canyon. I even hear voices..."

  "It's just the wind," Adalginza said anxiously.

  She clutched her shawl closer and gazed warily around her. A sudden gust rattled the dry leaves of the surrounding brush, which indeed sounded almost like the whisperings of the dead.

  The flames of the fire then swirled and danced eerily, as though taking on an ominous life of their own.

  Benfaaro struck a pose of intense listening, then fixed his gaze on his wife.

  "It would be easy for you to rule Talan, since he already is your lover." He smiled grimly at Bruna's surprised look. "Did you think me a fool? I have always suspected your foul little secret."

  "Have you?" Bruna asked coolly. "Then I will no longer bother to try to hide it from you."

  Adalginza regarded Bruna in disgust. "You are despicable. And why do you assume that I will marry Talan, as though I have no will of my own?"

  Bruna laughed wickedly, and nodded her head in Benfaaro's direction.

  "Tell her."

  Benfaaro took another sip of tea, and addressed his sister sadly.

  "You will marry Talan because I will decree it to be so. Nor will my word be disputed when, through such a union, I transfer power through you to Talan. But this power will exist for only as long as you are alive, because you are the one Of The Blood."

  "But why would you do such a thing?" Adalginza was shocked at hearing these words. "When last we spoke of this, you said that Talan was cruel and ambitious. That he was not right for me."

  Benfaaro again appeared to be listening to whisperings only he could understand.

  "Your union with Talan will be necessary, for your own sake. I can protect you after I am gone by giving those who would do you the most harm a reason to keep you alive. And as long as one Of The Blood lives, the tribes will remain united. Beyond that, I do not know what will happen…"

  Adalginza clenched both hands around the cup she held.

  "But why tolerate such treachery? Kill Bruna. Kill Talan. Or at the very least banish them from the Tribe of the Circles."

  At this point, Adalginza did not care that Bruna heard these words.

  But it was Bruna herself who answered with the utmost confidence.

  "Benfaaro will not do this. He knows that, if he dies, you lack the strength of will to take his place."

  Benfaaro nodded slowly in agreement.

  "It is true, little one. Without strong leadership, the tribes will not follow even one Of the Blood. I am strong. I can rule. Talan is strong. Through you, he can rule. With Bruna's guidance, of course."

  "And how are you so certain that I cannot do these things in your place?"

  "You do not know your own mind or heart." As he made his declaration, Benfaaro regarded her without emotion. "Beyond that, you have indigo eyes and the blood of our enemy in your veins. Yo
u are not entitled to a say in these matters."

  "And why not?"

  For the first time since her marriage to Captain Kalos, Adalginza found herself strongly moved beyond apathy.

  "Because I say so. So do not question."

  Her brother looked far away, as though he were now communing with the departed spirits that still resided here.

  "You were born only to do our bidding. Accept this, and you will be more content."

  "I am Of The Blood." Adalginza felt her ire stirring as strongly now as the winds gusting around them. "So do not dare to tell me that I am nothing. Do not forget, dear brother. I know about the The Prophecy of the Ancients."

  The silence from Benfaaro and Bruna that greeted her words was as deep as though she had slapped them both. Adalginza was shocked even at herself for daring to speak of something that had been so long repressed in her own memory.

  "It is forbidden to speak of The Prophecy." Benfaaro's tone was menacing.

  "Yet, our people know of it. It was whispered to me long ago by a child of the Tribe of the Circles."

  "And I told you then to never speak of it."

  Almost as though a force outside herself spurred her onward, Adalginza felt compelled to defy her brother.

  "The Prophecy speaks of a woman with indigo eyes, a woman Of The Blood, who will lead all the tribes. Surely this has meaning to all of us. Especially now."

  "Enough!" Benfaaro bellowed. "How dare you speak blasphemy? To repeat this foolishness means death to any tribesman. Were you not my sister, I would slay you right now."

  "It means death only because you decreed it to be so. And you are only a mortal man. The Ancients meant for The Prophecy to be passed down through the ages."

  "Be careful, sister," Benfaaro warned.

  "I have indigo eyes," Adalginza continued stubbornly. "And I am Of The Blood. This means something. I am certain of it."

  Bruna's lip curled into a sneer.

  "Enough. This pathetic delusion has gone too far. Hear me well, little one. You have nothing to do with The Prophecy, because you are only what we ourselves created. Benfaaro. And me. You belong to us."

  "I belong to myself."

  "There are no accidents. Think about it, Adalginza."

  "Bruna!" Benfaaro reached out and took his wife's wrist, as though to physically restrain her. "This is not necessary. I know my sister better than you. Adalginza will do as I say. She always does."

  But Bruna stood, pulling herself out of Benfaaro's grasp. She walked over to stand in front of Adalginza, hovering over her like a giant, feathered carrion eater about to devour a baby bird.

  "Consider this. Indigo eyes are found only in a few women of the Crescent Houses."

  "Yes," Adalginza said cautiously. "I know."

  "The trait in the Crescent Houses is passed only from fathers to their sons or daughters, but never from a mother to her children."

  "I know this, also. What is your point?"

  "The trait is uncommon. So in an outpost with very few citizens of the Crescent Houses present, Lady Donzala's real baby had indigo eyes. As did you. What does this tell you?"

  Adalginza slowly placed the cup she was holding on the rock beside her.

  "Lady Donzala's husband — the man who fathered her child. This was the man who violated my mother?"

  "It wasn't quite like that," Bruna corrected her. She smiled in a nasty way.

  "Don't," Benfaaro said.

  Bruna ignored his command.

  "Before Lady Donzala's husband was killed in battle, your real mother —Benfaaro's mother — approached this man on many occasions. She sold the use of her body to him. So that his seed would be planted in her. So that you could be born. And used for our purposes."

  "She was — a harlot?" Adalginza asked.

  Benfaaro jumped to his feet in outrage.

  "She only pretended to be one. And I will have no more of this talk of our mother! She sacrificed herself for our cause. Her memory should be honored."

  Adalginza stared into the fire, suddenly seeing within the flames the thicket of suckleberry blossoms. And the tiny mound of dirt and stones where Lady Donzala's baby had been buried.

  Not a stranger at all. But her true sister. By blood.

  No wonder Lady Donzala had treated Adalginza as her own. For Adalginza had, indeed, been born from her husband's own seed. Through her madness, she must have somehow recognized that.

  "Adalginza! Are you all right?"

  Adalginza looked up dazedly at Benfaaro. He reached out to take her shoulder and gently squeeze it.

  Bruna moved away, standing by the fire where she stretched out her hands to warm them. She looked back at Adalginza with seething contempt.

  "Is all of this really true?" Adalginza asked Benfaaro.

  "It is," he said. "But it makes no difference."

  Adalginza gazed at her brother with growing awareness.

  "Lady Donzala loved me as dearly as any real mother would love her own child. My own mother slept with the enemy, then gave me away — to the enemy."

  Bruna's laughed wickedly. "She could hardly bear to look at you after you were born. She thought your indigo eyes were loathsome."

  "It was not like that," Benfaaro said gently. "I was there when you were born. Our mother cried when you were taken from her arms."

  "Nevertheless, she let me go."

  "She was eager to be rid of you," Bruna interrupted with gleeful malice.

  "Listen well."

  Benfaaro held Adalginza's eyes, imploring her.

  "It was a great sacrifice for our mother to let you go. She died when you were only three, or you would have known her as I knew her. But I remember that she would hide in the thicket near the Place of the Circles and watch you play with the animals. You had her gift. She was very proud of that."

  "What about you?" Adalginza asked. "How did you feel?"

  Bruna sneered at her. "You were nothing. The only reason he paid you any attention at all was to further our plans."

  "Not so." Benfaaro regarded Adalginza sadly. "I have always cared about you, little one. Was I not always in your life, reminding you of who you really were?"

  "And who is that person? Even my own name does not belong to me."

  Benfaaro looked genuinely puzzled at her reaction.

  "Before my father died of the plague, he taught me that being Of The Blood is a heavy burden. But I gladly accepted this responsibility, knowing that I would never truly have a life of my own. And so should you. Your duty is to serve your people. And to serve me. So what does it matter who you really are?"

  "It matters to me."

  Adalginza shook her head slowly, as she gazed back into the fire.

  "I may not know who I am. But I know what I am. I am a murderer of innocent children slaughtered in the caravans that have been ambushed, because of the information I gave you."

  "All for a greater good. For our people. And for the glory of the moon gods."

  "So you say. But each time the man who calls me wife shares a confidence in our marriage bed, I betray him to you. I ask you again. Who and what does that make me?"

  "Medosa was too much a part of your life," Benfaaro retorted angrily. "And mine, too. Though I was older and much less vulnerable than you. His words warp you still. I should have killed him much sooner."

  "You see?" Bruna addressed Benfaaro. "I told you she is weak. She has no stomach for any of this. Bring her back with us now, so she can marry Talan. You know we need her under our protection, if something happens to you. She need only stay out of our way after she is wed."

  Hearing the two of them so casually discuss her future, as though she had no say in any of it, served only to deepen Adalginza's despair.

  Her next argument sounded feeble even to her own ears.

  "Killing the innocent is never the answer. It does not please the gods. It angers them. And I believe there is a better way."

  Benfaaro leaned his head back against a boulder, and peered up
at the dark sky. He raised his hands briefly, palms upward, as he consulted the wisdom of the deities of the six visible crescent moons suspended overhead.

  Then he dropped his hands.

  "When we slaughter every man, woman, and child in each caravan that enters the frontier, we send a message to the Crescent Houses on the Prime Continent. The more horrible the deaths, the greater the fear. Who would want to come here to steal our land, if torture and death are the prices that must be paid? This is the only way."

  "You are wrong. What you are doing inflames hatred against us."

  "Let them hate us," Benfaaro answered. "At least hate is a form of respect."

  "No. Please listen to me. I have learned much about the Crescent Houses. They are many people and many voices."

  "As are we."

  "Yes, but they have far, far greater numbers. We once had many supporters on the Prime Continent, people who wanted to protect our right to live in our own way outside the jurisdiction of the Crescent Houses. The Prime Congress of the Crescent Houses even once considered giving savages full right to property ownership."

  "They have no right to grant us what is already ours!" Benfaaro retorted angrily.

  "I understand that. But now our friends among the Crescent Houses are fewer. And there is a growing movement among a faction known as the Eradicators. They demand revenge, and they have members among most of the Houses. All except the Eighth House, which shuns violence."

  "If they would stay where they belonged, there would be no need for revenge," Benfaaro said evenly.

  Adalginza picked up another ceramic cup placed next to the fire, and ladled herself more steaming brew from the iron pot.

  "You are right, of course. But each person you slaughter in the frontier leaves a grieving clan back on the Prime Continent. The ranks of the Crescent knights are growing in numbers never before seen in the past, because of volunteers. And now they are being sent in greater numbers to fortify the settlements."

  "Let them come," Benfaaro said defiantly. "We are better warriors by far."

  "If you goad those of the Crescent Houses much further, they will begin their own slaughter. And they will not stop."

  "They planned all along to destroy us anyway," Bruna said from where she still stood at the fire. "We are now simply striking first."