by Giles Carwyn
The two of them reached the end of the stairs. The top of the Wheel was covered with gardens, fountains, and sheltered walkways. It was alive with the color of flowers, the gurgle of flowing water, and the music of birdsong. In the center of it all stood the Hall of Windows, glittering like a huge jewel in the afternoon sun. Four towering archways of blue-white marble supported the domed amphitheater. A delicate spiderweb of copper latticework held up acres of stained glass comprising the walls and ceiling of the dome. Shara felt a lump in her throat as she looked at the beauty and grandeur of Ohndarien’s crown jewel.
Why was there so much ugliness in the world when people could create such beauty? Why was there so much fear and doubt when strength and courage were just a thought away? Above all else, Shara hated senseless ugliness. She despised neglect and filth. That was why she would become a Zelani. Shara was born to dirty, little people who hid in their dirty, little hovels, but she would live her life like the Hall of Windows, rising above it all like an icon of beauty, reflecting her light into the world.
Brophy tentatively reached out and touched her shoulder. “Shara, I know you’ll get what you want. You always do. You’ll do great.”
“Thank you, Brophy.” She gave his hand a genuine squeeze, then, unable to help herself, she went low to poke him in the stomach.
To her surprise, his hand shot out and caught her wrist. His fingers were warm and firm as steel.
“Be careful, all right?” he said, his serious face making him appear twice his age.
Shara suddenly remembered the man who gave her his cloak a few nights ago. She breathed through the tightness in her stomach and let it go. “I will,” she promised.
She stood up on tiptoe to kiss Brophy on the cheek. “Be good. Don’t always listen to what Trent says.”
Shara felt the boy’s eyes linger on her back as she left the procession and joined the other Zelani in front of the Spring Gate. She must stand with the other students while Brophy continued around the circular path to join the Children of the Seasons.
Most of the Zelani students were already there, fifty youngsters ranging from ten to eighteen years old. They would enter last, when the rest of the amphitheater was full. The youngest pupils were still fidgety in their formal clothes, but they would learn decorum quickly. Nervous students did not last long.
Brophy came to the councils because he loved them. Shara, on the other hand, was required to attend. Brother Krellis wanted the Zelani students to be seen. One day, each of them would become attached to the most important friends of the Free City. They were one of the most valuable currencies of Ohndarien politics, and everyone in the world would see what could be theirs…if they remained faithful.
Shara took her place next to Caleb, the most senior of the male students. She subtly pulled her foot out of her sandal and ran a toe down the inside of his calf. The boy cracked a small smile, but continued to stare straight ahead, concentrating on his breathing. Of all the older boys, Caleb was the most fun to tease. He was sweet to the bone, but so solemn. She tried to trip him up whenever she could.
Unable to get a rise out of him, she turned to study the crowd making its way toward the Hall. She looked into people’s eyes, tried to guess what they were feeling. She tried to imagine what it would be like to be assigned to one of these men. What would they be like, alone in the dark? How could she make their inner fire burn bright as the sun?
Shara’s pulse quickened. Without knowing why, she sensed Krellis as he walked up the path. Everyone politely stepped aside as the Brother of Autumn came closer. He was not particularly handsome or finely dressed, but the crowd made way for him like the sea receding from the shore. His black hair was wild, but his face drew everyone’s attention wherever he went.
The Brother of Autumn had no Zelani. Some said that Baelandra served that purpose for him, but Shara didn’t believe it. He was waiting for the right student to graduate.
After all these years, many Ohndariens still disapproved of the foreign Brother. Despite those who resented Krellis’s position on the council, Ohndarien had flourished under his guidance. He’d tripled the size of the army and kept the ports running day and night. Native Ohndariens still mourned the loss of their missing Brothers who went north into the Vastness to honor an ancient, secret alliance. Brophy had never met those men, but he bore their loss like a knife wound.
As Krellis approached, Shara noticed a stooped, ancient man walking next to him. The old man had the powdered, milk-white skin and curly, jet-black hair common to the ruling class of the far western empire. Krellis dwarfed the smaller man, who barely came up to his shoulder. The foreigner hovered next to Krellis, holding onto his shirt like a toddler clings to his mother’s skirts. Shara’s instructors had told her how the men from Ohohhom were required to hold on to the sleeve of any man who outranked them. The sleeve holder would, in turn, have his sleeve held by another man of lesser rank. She’d heard stories of entire processions of Ohohhim walking through their imperial palace in perfect social marching order. Shara imagined them like a line of four-year-olds playing follow the leader.
A tiny woman with the same milk-white face and black hair followed directly behind the ancient Ohohhim. She held on to his shirt just like the man was holding on to Krellis’s. The woman could have been fifteen or fifty. It was hard to judge her painted face, especially when she kept her gaze locked on the ground.
Krellis must have felt rather foolish with a line of ghost-faced foreigners hanging off him, but he showed no unease with the strange custom. He carried himself with the same grace and fierce dignity as always.
To Shara’s surprise, Krellis left the procession and brought the Ohohhim right up to her. She curtsied as low as she could, as befitted the formal occasion.
“Father Lewlem, this is Shara,” Krellis said, inclining a hand toward her.
She curtsied again, not quite as low, toward the foreigner.
“She is the Zelani student I spoke of earlier.”
“Daughter of my heart, it is a joy to meet you again for the first time,” the old man said with a playful twinkle in his eye. She liked him immediately. She had rarely met anyone so old who still smiled like a child.
“Father of my heart,” she said, remembering the proper reply from an etiquette lesson years ago, “I remember you fondly, even though I’ve never seen your face.”
“Would you accept the honor,” Krellis asked Shara, “of being Father Lewlem’s guide for the rest of the evening? I regret I have other duties I must attend to.”
“I would be honored,” she replied, without a trace of formality. Krellis had never spoken to her before. He obviously knew she was about to graduate. It thrilled her that he knew so much about her.
Father Lewlem carefully smoothed Krellis’s sleeve where he had been holding it and tucked his hands into a fold of his robes.
Krellis quickly leaned forward and whispered in Shara’s ear, “Hold on to his wife’s sleeve and do not let go until she has given you leave.”
Shara looked past Lewlem at the tiny woman standing a few paces behind him. She was so small and meek she looked like a scolded child. As Krellis took his leave, Shara slipped deftly around Lewlem and pinched his wife’s sleeve between thumb and forefinger. She stole a moment of eye contact with Caleb, who smiled in approval.
“Shall we rejoin the procession, Father?” she asked, unsure of the protocol.
The old man smiled and clapped his hands together in front of him like a little kid. “Yes, yes, let us see how this ‘free’ city governs herself.”
Shara waited for the Ohohhim to go ahead and followed him along the path. This council marked the first day of autumn, so everyone would enter the hall through the Autumn Gate on the far side of the Wheel.
“In the Center of the World, where I am from,” the old man began, “the Emperor speaks and reality follows. He holds the power of Oh on earth and has never been wrong in five thousand years. It is the superior way of life, I say, but I am ve
ry curious to see the sleeve you follow here.”
Possible replies tumbled through Shara’s mind, but she decided to trust the smile in the old man’s eyes more than the formality of his words.
“Life would be simpler if we had an Emperor as well. Here in Ohndarien, I am afraid, we are wrong all the time.”
Lewlem giggled like a little girl and clapped his hands again.
“Ah, the bluntness of the East, it is a barbarian delight.”
Shara smiled back at him, knowing she had read him correctly.
“Please,” the old man said, “tell me of your city. I know much that you will say, but I wish to hear the story from the lips of my lovely daughter.”
As they continued along with the procession, Shara gave Lewlem the brief history of Ohndarien she had been trained to deliver.
“To explain Ohndarien, I must start at the beginning. Construction of the walls began less than 250 years ago. We are a relatively young city, but unique in the world. The four families that started the construction brought very diverse talents to the table. The Geldars had been living in this bay for hundreds of years, before Ohndarien was even a dream in the mind of Donovan Morgeon. The Geldars made their living fishing, herding, and quarrying marble from the mountain and shipping the blocks both east and west. They were the first to embrace Donovan’s vision and provided most of the labor for building the city. They eventually became the House of Summer and the majority of Ohndarien’s population.”
The glittering sunlight reflecting off the stained-glass dome made it difficult to look at anything else. The intricate beauty of the craftsmanship still amazed her after all this time. Shara pointed out a glittering depiction of the sculpted towers and lush shoreline of Efften, the doomed homeland of Ohndarien’s founding fathers.
“The Morgeons fled from Efften when the City of Sorcerers was overrun. They were one of the few families to escape the slaughter. Though they had been a family of scholars, exile forced them to become merchants. They wandered the Great Ocean for two generations before Donovan Morgeon, at the helm of his first trading vessel, visited the Geldars. He spent the next forty years dreaming of building Ohndarien.
“Morgeon imagined a road over the mountains, carrying goods back and forth in wagons. However, his idea didn’t become practical until he met the renowned Master Coelho. The Morgeons became the House of Winter and are the greatest traders and scholars in Ohndarien.
“Coelho was a master architect who had spent his life building the famous Gildheld waterworks. Donovan sought out the master architect when he visited the Summer Seas. Morgeon’s idea sparked the tired old man’s imagination, and they spent the next year planning the broad strokes of the city. Coelho proposed the ideas for the locks, the windmills, and the Water Wall. The old man was too weak to travel, and he died long before construction ever started, but his genius made Ohndarien possible. His wife and children perfected the plans that Coelho began. His descendants went on to become the House of Spring and now tend the ports and waterworks in Ohndarien.”
Shara smiled. “They say Master Coelho still lives in the stone of the walls and the water of the locks.”
“I am sure he does,” Lewlem said. “The spirits of the dead remain with us forever, just within the shadow of Oh’s cave.”
Shara made the sign of respect she had been taught and continued with her story.
“Despite a working plan, Donovan’s dream could not take shape without the money or military might to start the project. There was no point in building a city if he could not defend it. Donovan went from kingdom to kingdom, back and forth across the two oceans looking for someone to lend him the gold and soldiers to start his project, but his ideas were so radical that no one believed it would work.”
“He came to the Opal Palace,” Lewlem chimed in. “The Emperor wisely refused his request.”
Shara couldn’t be sure if the old man was being sarcastic. She hoped he had enough sense of humor to laugh at his own God on Earth, but it was hard to read his face. She nodded respectfully and continued with her story.
“Donovan was finally approached by J’Qulin the Sly, the infamous mercenary commander of the Lightning Swords. J’Qulin had grown wealthy and reviled by constantly switching sides in a series of civil wars between Upper and Lower Kherif. Although J’Qulin had a reputation for being treacherous, Donovan believed him when he claimed to have grown weary of war. J’Qulin wanted to marry, settle down, and enjoy his riches, but he had a responsibility to his men. They were hated and feared throughout the two oceans. No kingdom would sell them land.”
“The Emperor refused this man as well. One could say that your fair city could not have been built without Ohohhim wisdom,” Lewlem said.
“I’m sure the world would stop spinning if the Emperor did not hold her center so artfully.”
Lewlem clapped again, giggling uncontrollably. “Well spoken, my daughter, well spoken. Please continue with your tale.”
The procession had passed through the Autumn Gate’s archway of gold and red leaves into the Hall of Windows. The crowd took their seats around a large amphitheater. The soaring dome that enclosed the council chambers was even more beautiful from the inside. The stained glass overhead was angled so that different parts of it caught the light in every season. The feel of the cavernous room changed from month to month. In autumn red and gold glass caught the light most directly. Blue and silver light filled the Hall in winter. Spring brought yellow and pale green. And in summer the stained glass high overhead broke the sunlight into every color of the rainbow.
Shara thought the hall was most beautiful by moonlight, when the entire room was hung in dark blue shadow as if it were deep underwater.
A circle of blue-white marble lay at the center of the auditorium, with eight stone chairs placed upon it. In the very center of the circle was a hole that dropped down to the Heart of Ohndarien, the sacred chamber where the Test of the Stone was given to those who sought a seat on the council.
Shara often caught herself staring at the shadowy opening that led down to the Heart. Brophy would go down that hole someday. He might never come back up. She took a breath and continued her story.
“J’Qulin could have conquered a small city and ruled it by the sword, but he had destroyed so many things in his life, he longed to create something instead. Donovan agreed to trust the man when no one else would, and suddenly he had gold, an army, and a new best friend. J’Qulin married fourteen women, fathered forty children and died at sixty-five with a sword in his hand, defending Ohndarien from the third of many invasions. His children became the House of Autumn and are responsible for collecting taxes and defending the walls of Ohndarien.”
“Fourteen wives is very impressive,” Lewlem noted. “I myself have only four…so far.”
The old man looked sideways at her through the corner of his eye. One side of his powdered lips curled upward.
Shara couldn’t help smiling. She liked this man, liked him a great deal. She continued with her story.
“The aqueduct, canals, and locks took seventy-five years to build. Donovan Morgeon was carried in his bed on the first ship to sail through the locks from the Great Ocean to the Summer Sea. He was 134 years old. The stories say that he died with a smile on his face the moment his ship sailed out of the city.”
Lewlem clapped again. “It is a beautiful story. A very Eastern story, but beautiful nonetheless.”
“But our history was not always so beautiful. That is why we have the Brothers and Sisters of the Seasons.”
“Eight people to rule one city. Sounds like a wife with eight husbands to me.”
Shara glanced at Lewlem’s wife. The woman had not said a word nor lifted her eyes from the ground the entire time. She wondered what the two of them were like alone in bed with no one else around.
A hush fell over the crowd as a tall, white-haired woman in a green gown entered the amphitheater through the flower-covered Spring Gate.
“That’s Jayde
n, the Sister of Spring,” Shara whispered to her guest. “The torch she carries symbolizes the Brother of Spring who is still missing.”
Jayden was nearly eighty and prone to nodding off during council meetings, but Shara had heard that her senility was half an act. The old woman still had teeth, and she wasn’t afraid to use them.
A second woman with a torch entered through the evergreen Summer Gate. This woman was in her late forties, blond-haired and plump. She wore a modest gown of yellow and gold. She smiled so broadly that she always looked a little stupid.
“Hazel, Sister of Summer,” Shara explained.
Next came Baelandra and Krellis, arm in arm through the Autumn Gate. Every head turned to watch them. The Brother of Autumn was twice the size of the petite green-eyed beauty at his side, but she blazed every bit as bright. Baelandra had always been breathtaking. Her red hair seemed to flicker like a torch in the daylight.
“The woman beside Krellis is Baelandra, Sister of Autumn,” Shara explained.
“The sun must be jealous of her beauty,” Lewlem noted.
Shara felt a stab of jealousy but breathed it out.
“She is also the youngest woman ever to take the Test of the Stone. Her beauty is the least of her virtues.”
As Baelandra and Krellis walked by, the Sister of Autumn noticed Shara and gave her a slight smile. Baelandra was also Brophy’s aunt and the kindest woman Shara had ever met. When Shara ran away from the Zelani school so many years ago, Trent and Brophy brought her home, and Baelandra took her in immediately. At the time, Shara thought she had them all fooled. She acted as though she was a lost orphan, not a renegade Zelani student. Baelandra had taken her at her word and said nothing of it. The Sister of Autumn must have known who Shara was all along, but Baelandra bided her time and waited for Shara to make her own decision. When Shara finally confessed who she was, Baelandra had nodded just as she had when Shara claimed to be an orphan.
“And what will you do now?” was the Sister’s only question.
