by Sharon Lee
“I’ll see you in school, tomorrow,” he said. “All right?”
She stared at him, the pen and the letter like stones in her pocket.
She had the measure of his stubbornness now; he would not go until he had an answer. Until he had the answer he wanted. That was well, then.
“All right,” she said.
“That’s set firm, then,” Mike Golden said briskly. “C’mon, Silver—we both got work to do before this day is over. ’Night, Anna. Nathan. Good you happened by.”
He put his hand on Syl Vor’s shoulder, and the two of them walked off.
Kezzi looked to Udari, who nodded.
“Come,” he said. “We must find Rafin and Rys, and then deliver you, O daughter of surprises, to the luthia.”
They turned as one, Udari moving quickly. At the first turn toward the kompani’s
gate, they met Rafin, who asked her roughly if she were harmed.
“No, I’m well,” she told him.
“Must you carry the dog?” he asked then, and she swallowed against the hard lump in her throat.
“I want to.”
“Some burdens are no weight,” Udari agreed, and looked to Rafin. “Where is our brother Rys?”
“He was at the end of his strength, and bade me leave him, saying he would catch us, when he had rested.”
“You left him alone?” Udari’s voice was harsh.
“He would have it so,” Rafin replied, frowning. “I swore that we would return for him.”
“Yes,” said Udari, and on that word leapt into a run.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The child sat on the hearth-rug, her head bent, and Silain’s shawl tucked around her. The dog, her faithful friend, was asleep with his head on her knee. It seemed that the child must be asleep, too, worn out from her adventure, but the luthia saw the hand resting on the dog’s side move in a slow stroke.
Well, then.
Silain sat on the rug next to the child and put her hand on the drooping shoulder.
“What time,” she asked softly, “does school begin tomorrow?”
“I don’t know,” Kezzi answered.
“That will make it difficult to attend.”
Kezzi stirred and looked up.
“I’m not going to school,” she said. “I’m going to stay here, in kompani and never go to the City Above again.”
“You are Droi’s apprentice,” Silain pointed out mildly. “You must go to the City Above, to perfect the art of the cards.”
Kezzi bit her lip.
“Of this other thing,” Silain persisted, though it struck her to the heart to badger the child when she was so tired. “Did you say to your brother that you would see him tomorrow, at school?”
Kezzi sniffed. “Who tells the truth to a gadje?”
“Does a sister lie to a brother?”
“I am not his sister!”
“Did you tell me that he gave you the pen, from brother to sister?”
“Yes.” Black eyes were wary, now.
“And you received the pen, as the sister of your brother. It is done, and sealed. Tell me what we owe our brothers, and our sisters, and all of the kompani of Bedel.”
“Truth,” Kezzi whispered, “kindness, food, air.”
“And what do you owe this boy, your brother?”
Kezzi stared at her, eyes wide and shocked. “Luthia…”
“What do you owe your brother, Kezzi of the Bedel?” Silain repeated, implacable.
There was a long silence before the child bowed her head and whispered.
“All that I would have myself.”
“So, then.” Silain extended a hand and touched the child’s knee.
“After all,” she said. “It was foretold.”
Kezzi blinked at her, and Silain smiled.
“Do you remember, when I asked you to dream for me? In the darkness, you found a most marvelous pen…”
The child’s eyes widened. She snatched at her pocket and pulled the pen out, staring, even as her fingers caressed it.
“Four colors,” she whispered. “Green…red…blue…black.”
She looked up, lips parted.
“But—why?”
Silain shook her head. “Why we are given to glimpse one thing out of all that might be seen, not even the luthia know for certain. It does seem that we are allowed to see those things which will…weigh heavy in our lives.”
“A pen?” Kezzi asked, her brows drawing together.
“Or a boy,” Silain said, serenely. “Time will teach you what and why. Now, of this other thing: You will attend school tomorrow, as you promised your brother. Afterward, you will go with him to pay proper respect to your mother, and to perform any work she asks of you. Also, you will give her my letter, which I will write tonight.”
“Yes, Grandmother,” Kezzi said, looking again at the pen in her hand.
After a moment, she looked up. “How will I learn when school opens?”
“You will ask your brother Torv if such a thing lies in his knowledge. Go, now, and when you come back, we will drink tea together, and talk about tomorrow.”
* * *
Ms. ker’Eklis had pushed his math lesson—had pushed him, allowing shorter and shorter time for consideration of the problems she posed. The last three…he had simply answered the first thing that came into his head. When the questions stopped coming, he sat shivering in his chair, as if he had extra adrenaline to work off, while she went through his responses, marking off three with her pen against the screen.
“This, this, and this. For the first two, you will produce the correct answer; I will expect to see all of your work. For the third, which is correct, I will see the work, also.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, his voice shaking.
She gave him a sharp glance. “You will also complete the next module so that we may review it together at our next meeting.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said again, slightly stronger this time.
“That is well. Have you any questions regarding today’s exercises, or the self-tests?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Very good. I will meet you at the usual time on the day after next. I do not expect you to be late.”
Syl Vor sat up straight, hearing a scold.
“I hadn’t expected to be late today, ma’am,” he said, wishing his voice wasn’t so shaky. “Necessity…intervened.”
“So I learned from your mother.”
Ms. ker’Eklis rose, and Syl Vor scrambled to his feet to bow respect to the teacher.
“Good-day,” she said coolly.
He held his bow until he heard her close the door, and her steps receding down the hall. Then, he straightened, fast and hard, and spun into a tight dance that was all kicks and jabs; knees, elbows, shoulders, hands, feet, spinning and ducking to avoid the walls and the corners and the furniture, and collapsing all at once on his back on the bed, arms and legs wide, panting, his hair sticking damply to his forehead, heart pounding.
In this position, the ceiling was his view.
The ceiling of his sleeping room at ho- at Trealla Fantrol had been painted with flying dragons. He had used to stare at them sometimes and pretend they were playing games—tag, see-you, and Jump-in. Of course, he had been very young, then.
At Jelaza Kazone, the nursery ceilings were painted with stars in strange constellations, ships, and geometric shapes in bright colors. And of course the ceilings, and the walls, and the floors at Runig’s Rock had all been grey stone.
Here at his mother’s house, there was a garden on the ceiling. There were many flowers, in a confusion of colors, and a number of low bushes with prickly-looking dark leaves. Under one such shrubbery was a furry creature with long-ish ears that Syl Vor thought might be a rabbit. There were birds in another—one each of blue, red, and yellow—and purple berries.
Something hit the bed by his head, making the very softest of thumps. He turned his head slowly, and met Eztina’s eyes. There was a
little rumple in the fur of her forehead, as if she was worried to find him here on top the blankets, sweaty in the aftermath of his dance, and staring at the ceiling.
“Good afternoon,” Syl Vor said softly, and added, because Eztina would of course be interested in such matters, “I have a sister.”
Eztina blinked, leaned close and snuffled the sticky hair at Syl Vor’s temple.
“That tickles. My sister’s name is Kezzi, but that’s only for the House. For the street, her name is Anna Brown. She has a dog, and an older brother who she called Nathan.”
Eztina put her nose on his. Hers was cold, and her whiskers tickled.
“Stop that!” He moved his arm, got a hand clumsily under her belly and lifted her to his chest. She stood where he had put her, each foot weighing more than she did.
“She said—Kezzi said—that she would come to school tomorrow. Do you think she will?”
Eztina blinked.
Syl Vor sighed. “Well, I hope she will, too…but I think she might have not been quite truthful. We’re…gah-gee—I think that means outworlder. It—I—It would be very bad if her honor were…impinged. Because of me.”
He frowned, trying to work out if one’s honor could be sullied by breaking faith with an outworlder. Grand-aunt said that the Code governed Liadens wherever they went—but Kezzi wasn’t Liaden. Grandfather…
Grandfather said that one ought to act with honor on all occasions, and that honor called honor.
Grandfather deferred to Grand-aunt’s greater knowledge of the Code, but he was, so Padi had said, very nice in his manners, and extremely particular in matters of Balance.
If Kezzi’s honor were drawn to—well, not to his honor, really; he was only a boy, but to the clan’s honor, with which he was invested—at least, that was what the Code said. If Kezzi’s honor were drawn to Korval’s honor, then she had told the truth, and would come to school.
Syl Vor closed his eyes, immensely relieved to have reached a reasonable conclusion.
Of course, Kezzi’s grandmother might not allow it, he thought then, his stomach clenching—and then relaxing. Obedience to an elder was honorable, so—
Four points of pressure on his chest increased painfully—and were gone.
“Gnh!” Syl Vor sat up, staring at a cat’s high, sinuous tail as she walked into the little alcove that was his study room.
He sighed, and rolled off the bed.
Eztina was right. Ms. ker’Eklis had left him a lot of work to do, and he’d best get to it if he wanted to finish before dinner.
* * *
“Luthia, a word, if you will.”
Silain opened her eyes.
“For the headman, a sentence,” she said. “Will you have tea?”
“Tea would make the telling less dry.”
She stood to fetch the kettle and the mugs. The child had not yet returned from her errand. Perhaps Torv had not been easy to find.
She poured tea, and brought the mugs to the hearth, handing one to Alosha. He stood politely while she settled herself, waiting for her permission before he dropped cross-legged to the rug.
It was the way of the Bedel to sit quietly over tea for a small time, until the hearts of those gathered beat as one. This had never been Alosha’s way; he was one who led with his head, and did not stint his tongue.
Silain therefore sipped her tea, waiting…and waiting more, with growing surprise.
Half a mug was drunk, by patient sips, before Alosha the headman cleared his throat and spoke.
“How fares Dmitri?”
Here was another surprise. The headman could himself walk to Dmitri’s hearth and inquire of Ves and Luma. There was no need to make inquiry of the luthia on so straightforward a matter.
Yet, he had asked, and he was the headman. The luthia could but reply.
“He proceeds at a stately pace. Early this day, he and I prayed together. He spoke at length of what, and who, he hoped to meet, when he came into the World Unseen. I think that another three days will see him safely over. He is content, and his death will be a good one.”
“His death,” Alosha repeated, and leaned toward her, his eyes intent.
“Luthia, the Bedel are on chafurma; the numbers are fixed.”
Ah. Suddenly it made sense, this visit; and this specific inquiry. Alosha thought long, as a headman must.
Silain moved her hand, inviting him to continue.
“The numbers are fixed,” he repeated. “When Dmitri crosses into that kinder place, the numbers will be in disarray. There is no coming birth to balance his death. I have counted, I have dreamed, and again have I counted and dreamed. Now I come to the luthia to beg her wisdom. If we are not to be fruitful with each other, how then will we survive? If we become fruitful with those in the City Above, how will we remain who we are? And—this troubles me most of all—are we, after this length with no news, to suppose that something ill has befallen those others of us, and that chafurma…will not, for us, end?”
Long thoughts, indeed.
There was a rustle near the hearth, and the smallest click of claw on stone. The child and her faithful friend had returned. Silain considered sending them to Jin, and then decided not. The child was her apprentice, and strange knowledge was the lot of both the luthia and the luthia-to-be.
“We went outside,” Silain said to Alosha, “and got Rafin.”
“We did. But how many others can we get before we are something else?”
Silain waited. After a moment, Alosha sighed, gustily, and put the mug down by his knee.
“There is more. The garda have expanded their watch. You know this. What you do not know, I think, is that we have closed and sealed two of the nearer gates. The risk of them was too great. If this continues, we will no longer be hidden, luthia, we will be trapped.”
“Will it continue?” Silain asked. “The garda have come before, and, after a time, they have gone away again.”
“This Boss Conrad. He lights a fire in their bellies. More! Those others who have come on-world—the People of the Tree, and their allies—they are eager for work. And hungry for room. It is said in the City Above that Boss Conrad looks at the buildings above us, and sees housing and hydroponics for his people.”
Silain closed her eyes. There was something—the tang of something dream-known, at the back of her tongue. But faint. So very faint.
“Luthia?”
Without opening her eyes, she raised a hand, and Alosha the headman composed himself to silence.
The dream…it tasted nearly as old as the story of Riva, and for a moment she thought that it was too far and too fragile to bring forward. If she could but locate some marker, she might find it again, among the dreams she held in keeping for the kompani—and suddenly, it was there, in fullness. Not a story-dream, but a piece of history, filed under Bedel cleverness, and strategies for survival among the gadje.
“How if,” she said to the headman, her voice dreamy and slow. “How if we say to Boss Conrad that we the Bedel have…established tenancy, and the buildings are ours.”
Silence greeted this; a silence so charged with misgiving that it crackled along the luthia’s nerves and awakened blue lightnings in her long sight.
She opened her eyes.
Alosha the headman sat cross-legged on her rug, arrested in the act of filling his pipe.
“You—” he began, swallowed and began again. “The luthia would advise us to deal openly with the gadje and claim ownership of this, our kompani’s grounds?”
Frank horror informed the headman’s voice, and Alosha was not one who came easily to fear.
“It has been done before,” Silain told him calmly. “And we do not say that we own this building—though we might, with no breaking of custom. After all, it is not true that we own this space or the warehouses above us.” She gave him a sharp glance. “Or is it true?”
“No,” Alosha said shortly. He finished packing his pipe, and reached to the hearth for an ember.
“
This was done before, you say? By the Bedel?” he asked, after the pipe was going to his satisfaction.
“It was.”
“And the outcome?”
“The gadje granted to the kompani the right to remain where they had set camp. The garda was made to know that the Bedel were not vagrants.” She raised a finger as another bit of information rose from the old dream.
“The gadje populated that space hard by the kompani, which the kompani had not claimed.”
“And so the kompani was absorbed by the gadje? Or did chafurma end in bright joy and happiness?”
Silain frowned; shook her head in frustration.
“I will need to dream again.”
Alosha nodded, drew on his pipe and exhaled a fragrant cloud of smoke.
“And the question of the numbers?”
“There, too, I will dream. We know there have been those who have not returned from chafurma, but their dreams are lost to us.”
Silence while the headman smoked, gloomily.
“It may be that it will be solved for us, if we adopt this established tenancy and the gadje come to live eye-to-eye with the Bedel. We will cease to be Bedel. Our dreams will be lost, and our children’s children will be gadje.”
“It may be. It may not be,” Silain said to him. “I will seek the fullness of this dream. We have time for that. When we have dreamed in fullness, then perhaps we ought to share with the kompani, and call for an Affirmation.”
Alosha smoked for a time, then abruptly extended a long arm to knock the ashes out of his pipe.
“There is much in what you say, luthia.” He tucked the pipe away and rose. “I leave you now to your hearth and your dreams.”
“Headman. The kompani sits in your hand.”
“Well I know it, Grandmother.”
He bowed, and walked away, down the commons, toward his own hearth.
Not until the headman’s shadow had melted into the larger shadows, did Silain the luthia raise her head and say, “Come forward, sister. Bring the teapot and a mug for yourself.”
Kezzi dropped to her knees on the rug, poured tea into Silain’s mug, and what was left of the pot into hers.
“So, little sister?”
The child looked up, her eyes opaque.
“Torv says that school begins an hour past the winter dawn.”
