by Aderyn Wood
Yuli glimpsed his mother in the crowd. Tears streaked her cheeks and reflected in the firelight.
“Brothers, sisters,” Xaroth intoned for a final time, “our prosperity is assured and Agria has begun.”
The drum was followed by other drums now and the clans stood and danced becoming one seething celebration. All three night bodies shone high in the sky and a silvery-blue glow lit the evening. People sang and danced and laughed. Skins of alza were brought out and shared, and a whole deer was returned to the evenfire, the aroma of roasting venison filling the air.
Yuli laughed when his father embraced him and threw him in the air. “My son, you will make a fine Soragan, one that our clan will never forget.”
He ran to his mother who kissed the top of his head.
Anton also embraced him. “You made us proud, brother.”
Yuli beamed and held up his beads for his family to inspect. Then he went to get his bowl, his stomach was still queazy after drinking the blood and Amak had told him that she would make a fennel and clove tea after the ceremony to help with the digestion. Waves of nausea washed over him, but he was determined not to bring up the contents of his stomach. That would not please his father.
He raced to their white tent to retrieve a bowl and returned, looking for Amak and her promise of the tea, but he stopped when he saw Izhur in the distance. The Soragan spoke with Iluna. Yuli felt his stomach clench again and he swallowed hard to keep from vomiting. Izhur hadn’t said one word to him after the ceremony, but there he was talking to Iluna. Sometimes he thought his master needed lessons, not him. He lifted his head. Well, one day he might just get some.
Anton
“Your strength is good, son. It’s your aim that needs practise, but it will come in time.” Zodor coached Anton on his hunting skills as they trekked down the mountain. He’d missed the doe with his spear. The deer would have made a decent contribution to the summer feasting, and the praise he’d have received would have gone down just as well as the venison. Anton’s disappointment bit deep, but his father buoyed his spirits.
“You remind me of myself at your age.” Zodor smiled. A gleam of sweat made his muscles appear as defined and strong as the stone axehead he held.
Like all hunters’ sons, the best compliment was that he was just like his father.
Anton smiled. “Well, at least I didn’t come back empty handed.” He held up the rabbits that he had caught with his traps, and his satchel, overbrimming with mushrooms.
His father stopped to pick up a mushroom and sniff it. He took a bite and munched. “These are very fine. You know they are your mother’s favourite? I’ll tell you something else, son. Knowing your wife’s favourites is an important thing.”
“So that’s why you like to gather mushrooms and poppy flowers when you go hunting.”
Zodor ruffled his hair. “I always bring back more than what she was expecting. It makes her faith in her husband stronger. You should seek out Hennita while we are here; find out some of her favourite things.”
Anton froze. He didn’t want to talk about Hennita.
“Have you seen her?”
“Yes, Father. She is well.”
“At the next Agria you will be bonded. You will be eighteen summers then. I was bonded to your mother at sixteen. But I’m sure you can wait.”
Anton had witnessed a number of couple-bonds the night before last. It was considered good luck to bond on the second night of Agria, and most couples did so.
“I will wait.” He agreed. The truth was he didn’t like Hennita. He wasn’t sure when he’d decided that but the few times he had seen her and talked to her this Agria were enough to confirm it in his mind. She was pretty enough, with those curls and big eyes. But she lacked something; something vital.
“Zodor, greetings.” The Grand Soragan had called out to his father as they made their way through the camp. He was a very powerful Soragan now, his mother had told him. Anton knew that Xaroth had performed the couple-bond ceremony for his parents. His mother had reminisced about it many times. He liked hearing the story, too. It was customary for the Soragan of the woman’s clan to perform the rite. That meant old Belwas would perform his wedding rite at the next Agria. If the old Soragan was still alive in eight summers. Eighteen summers was an old age to get married. But Zodor was determined to have the ceremony take place at an Agria, and ten summers was too young for a boy to marry. Anton had no choice but to wait. And he was not unhappy about it. He would have a long bachelorhood.
“Grand Soragan, it is a great pleasure to see you again.” Zodor bowed his head.
The old Soragan limped toward them, bent over his staff, but he still seemed tall and powerful. ”How is your wife? We of the Snake still miss her you know.”
Zodor’s head flung up with pride. “I do not doubt it. She is a jewel in any clan, my wife. Come, Grand Soragan, will you share a cup of broth with us?”
The Soragan nodded and Zodor turned to Anton. “Run and tell your mother that I am bringing the Grand Soragan. She will want to be warned.”
Anton sprinted to the river. His mother spent time along the riverbank every morning with his grandmother, collecting sorrel leaves and other herbs.
“Good morning, Grandson.”
“Good morning, Grandmother.” Anton liked his grandmother. She was kind and warm and loved to tell him that she knew he would be a great hunter one day, just like his father. Anton loved Agria most for the hunting, but he also enjoyed spending time with grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, most of whom he’d not seen since he was just two summers old, and could barely remember.
His mother put her hands to her mouth when Anton told her of their coming guest, and then reached out to hold his hands. “Anton, this is a great privilege. Quickly, we must return to our tent.” She dropped her basket of herbs and told her mother she would return later. Then she marched her son back to their tent.
“Help me sweep the mat. No! Here, run and fill these, and if you see your brother tell him to come home.” She handed him their water jugs.
“Yes, Mother.” Where was Yuli? He spent too much time with the other children and not enough time helping their mother. Whenever Izhur called to take him for a lesson, Anton had to go looking for him. The boy had no discipline. It was true what others said; Yuli was coddled, surly.
Back at the river he filled the jugs quickly, but was distracted by a sound – the flapping of wings. He turned to see a large black bird land on a boulder by the riverbank. Its squawk echoed off the river rocks. The morning sunlight reflected blue gleams on its feathers.
“Oh,” someone said behind him and he turned.
There she was – Iluna. His stomach jumped the way it always did when he saw her now. Would she set the animals on him? Or tell that bird to pluck out his eyes with that huge beak? She was a witch, his father had told him. And looking at her, her hair as blue-black as the bird’s feathers, her eyes darker, he believed she was. He tried to stare her down, but fear took over, the way it always did now.
“I have to go,” he said, holding up the jugs of water, and he walked as fast as he could until he returned to the safety of the white tent.
He opened the flap of the tent and entered. His mother was serving his father and the Grand Soragan some of their breakfast broth. He walked through and set the water down in the corner.
His mother nodded and then gestured to the flap and he went outside. Clearly this was a conversation for the adults only.
He wondered what they were talking about. Probably his future couple-bond. His ears burned and his curiosity could not be restrained. He walked around to the back of their tent. The branches of a hazelnut provided enough cover to hide, and he made a comfortable spot beneath its heavy leaves, inclining his head so that his ear almost touched the tent’s surface.
“She is evil, I tell you. Just as you had foreseen, Soragan.” It was his father’s voice. “And he is blinded by it. All he speaks of is her light. As if the rest of us k
now what that means.”
“Husband,” his mother whispered.
“Do not interrupt, Ida. More broth, Grand Soragan?”
Anton gulped, imagining his mother agreeably doing her husband’s bidding.
“Go on, Zodor. Tell me more.” The quiet voice, almost a hiss, was the Grand Soragan’s.
“You know how she came into this world?”
“I’ve heard some wild statements from Izhur. Nothing from a rational mind. I’d appreciate hearing your view of things.”
Anton swallowed. His father didn’t like Izhur, even though he had entrusted his second son to him. But he’d had no choice there; Izhur was the clan’s Soragan and Yuli had the gift. Anton had wondered, though, why Yuli had so many tantrums and pouted so often. The truly gifted were supposed to be calm and selfless, according to the evenfire tales; the opposite of his young brother.
“That night she came into the world. I will never forget it. The dark storms filled the sky. It was the first night of Ilun. We tried to tell him, our Circle, that it was ill-omened. There was evil in the air; we could all feel it. The Malfir – just as you predicted.”
There was a pause. Anton steadied his breathing. They were talking of Iluna’s birth. She must be a witch!
“So many ill-omened events had occurred. Her father, Osun – he was a great hunter, one of our best – he had been killed on our way back from Agria by a lion. How could that happen to a hunter such as he?”
“Yessss,” the Soragan whispered. “Go on.”
“Many other things happened, too. But Neria, dying as she gave birth, I tell you this girl was not meant to come into this world. She will only bring harm, great harm. And he teaches her with my son by his side.”
“Husband, she has brought no ill-luck since—”
“You must forgive my wife, Grand Soragan,” Zodor cut in. “She has also been blinded by the girl. She was forced to give her breast when the girl was a babe. She has a mother’s soft view of the witch.”
“Do not call her that.” Anton’s mother’s voice was tight.
“So the Circle of Eight,” the Soragan interrupted, “they tried to have her sacrificed?”
“We did. I swayed them, just as you told me to do. It was easy to get them on side,” his father continued. “Izhur went off to do the task, but he returned, saying wild things about how she had a strong light, and that she was a gift, not a curse. He summoned some great magic and forced us to keep her. And now we are stuck with her.”
Anton gasped. Iluna was supposed to die?
“Shhh.”
“What is it?” Zodor asked.
“Are you sure we’re quite alone?” the Grand Soragan whispered.
Anton stood and skipped under the hazelnut branches before sprinting away. He ran to the back of the wolf encampment and slowed, wandering along the path that had brought them to Ona’s Valley. He calmed his breathing, trying to order his thoughts of Iluna – the witch. And then he saw her. She was peeling an orange fruit. Her black hair almost gleamed blue in the midday sunshine. She looked up and her dark eyes widened with fear.
Good, she was still afraid of him. That was something.
Izhur
Blue light struck through the smoke hole at the very top of their tent. It was the fourth night of Agria and Izhur sat with the other Soragans as they did every night after the evenfire meal. He watched the spiraling smoke from the small fire as it wound its way slowly up.
“Hentyl, this is a delicious brew. I enjoy it almost as much as Izhur’s honey drink.” Belwas held his cup for a prentice to refill. Stains blemished his tunic.
“I think you come here for the food and drink alone, Belwas. If we had to fast during this festival, to be sure we wouldn’t see you here,” Hentyl replied, disapproval on his aged face.
Belwas scoffed, but he had a devious glint in his eye.
“Soragans, I’d like to discuss a serious matter,” Grand Soragan Xaroth interrupted, darting a glance at Belwas from beneath troubled brows. His balding head, hook nose and small eyes always reminded Izhur of something cunning, predatory even. “As you all know, I still have no prentice.”
“Yes, that is serious.” Talso nodded his agreement as he always did whenever the Grand Soragan spoke.
Izhur raised an eyebrow. Xaroth was the oldest Soragan, veritably ancient. He should have chosen a prentice years ago, but his stubbornness had affected this issue, as it did everything else. Xaroth wanted to choose a novice from his own clan, the Snake. The trouble was, every year with every new birth, no child had presented with the gift. It wasn’t uncommon for clans to go through lengthy stretches in which a Soragan had to choose a novice from another clan rather than their own. It had happened with Izhur in fact. He had come from the Bear. Jakom had chosen him as there was no gift-born child in the Wolf at that stage. He had been young when he first left his family and clan to go with Jakom to the Wolf, just one and ten summers.
It had been a hard beginning. Zodor in particular made it difficult. He’d enjoyed playing his cruel boyish tricks at Izhur’s expense – snakes in his bedroll, tadpoles in his morning broth. Izhur got his revenge sometimes by using his gift, filling Zodor’s dreams with nightmares so that he went sniveling to his mother, like a baby. He and Zodor had hated each other from the very start.
But for a clan to go without a gift-born child for so long was very rare. Xaroth had become Soragan of the Snake at a young age, and he’d been waiting ever since for a novice to be born. It was past time he gave in and accepted a young one from a different clan.
Xaroth now looked at each of them as he spoke, his small dark eyes piercing. “I am asking you to tell me of your options. I intend to take a prentice with me when we return to our lands.”
Izhur raised his eyebrow again. Usually the novice would be sent for after the clan and family had been consulted and a time agreed on. That way everyone had the opportunity to prepare and say goodbye. It would be a long time before the child would see family again.
“That’s very soon,” Jana said, her young voice wavering.
“I will not negotiate on that; the prentice will leave with me and my clan, two days after Agria.”
Izhur looked to the floor, studying the reed mats. This was odd. After all these years Xaroth was now in a hurry to acquire a prentice. Did the old man have a premonition of what was to come? Did he believe his time to train a novice was diminishing? Jakom used to say that Xaroth was old when he was a boy. Izhur squinted at the Snake. His skin was papery thin and lined deep with a crisscross pattern of wrinkles. But his mind was sharp, and his quiet voice never wavered. How old was he?
“So I ask you again. Tell me your options,” Xaroth said.
Jana spoke once more, her voice shaking. She was the youngest Soragan among them. “We have a boy with the gift, though he is only four summers.”
Xaroth waved a hand. “That is no matter; I started my instruction at three.”
“I was planning on taking him on myself—”
“I will have a look at him,” Xaroth interrupted. “You are young, Jana, and too inexperienced to take on a novice just yet.”
Jana nodded. A light blush reddened her cheeks.
Izhur bit his tongue. Xaroth had no right to take another’s prentice, regardless of his Grand Soragan status. But Jana straightened and told Xaroth that the Deer clan would be honoured if he took on the young boy as his novice.
Xaroth nodded. “Anyone else?”
Silence.
Izhur caught Belwas’s eye over the rim of his cup as he wiped his chin and sat up straight to listen. The old bear was ruminating on something.
“The gifted are not as prominent as they once were,” Cypra spoke. As the second eldest, she was more the Grand Soragan’s equal than any other, and she held her stare level with Xaroth, seated beside her. “We have known this for many summers. Things have changed since the time of our ancestors; indeed since my own youth. As you know, it is a subject I have broached for discussio
n on more than one occasion.” Her eyes moved to each of them in turn.
Izhur remembered past Agrias. She had indeed brought up the topic of the diminishing numbers of those gift-born. And she’d been shut down for it.
“We’re not going to discuss that now, Cypra. The subject at hand is my new prentice.” Xaroth’s authority filled the space with the quiet hiss of his voice. “Now, does anyone else have a likely candidate to offer me?”
More silence.
The woman spoke again. “It seems to me that my topic is a most relevant one after all, Xaroth.”
The Grand Soragan licked his lips, his thin tongue just visible between slender lips as he shot her a poisonous look before quickly drawing a mask.
Izhur had attended four Agrias, two as a Soragan, and two as Jakom’s prentice. In that time he’d seen discussions and passionate debates but he’d never seen a violent disagreement among Soragans. The tension in the tent was as thick as a valley frost, and as cold. To have the two most senior Soragans argue would destabilize the entire Agria. With so many people, there were always disagreements among the clans, sometimes there were fights. People looked to the Soragans to guide them and provide stability in such matters. Izhur felt he should speak, or someone ought to.
“And what of binding? Very few of us have that gift now. Once, every Soragan had the ability, now we can count the bonded on one hand. And no child in two score summers has been born with that particular gift. When we die,” she nodded to Belwas and the other older Soragans around her, “that gift will die with us. If we do not start discussing it here…”
“Enough,” Xaroth’s quiet voice cut through. He stood, thin eyebrows furrowed. He pointed his staff at Cypra, an offensive gesture. “I said no more of that. This discussion is about my future novice, no more!”
Cypra also sprung to her feet, as quick as a doe, and while she was nearly of an age with Xaroth, her posture stood tall, as tall as Xaroth’s if he didn’t bend over. The amplitude of their many beads was on display and they glimmered and shimmered in the mixture of light from moon, sun, star and fire. All those strings of beads lay heavy round the bearers’ necks. It seemed to Izhur that they were equal in number. Curious. He had assumed Xaroth would have earned more than Cypra over the years. That was the natural order. The oldest Soragans wore the most beads.
