by Mary Gentle
After so much, to lose by so little, when we thought we’d won.
Night passed, clouds blocked the stars and then cleared as we flew southwards; cased in that small craft that sped on, five miles above the surface of the ocean. A speck inching across the face of the world: drawing steadily away from the northern continent, the telestres, the outbreaks of fighting; coming closer all the while to a desert coast and deserted canals, and a city that lies in the shadow of the Rasrhe-y-Meluur.
Corazon Mendez moved between the comlink console and the holotank, studying the heat-sensor images that the satellites transmitted from orbit.
‘Nothing yet …’ The black-uniformed woman slumped down into a seat beside me. She rubbed at her eyes. ‘I can’t raise Kumiel, but I imagine Clifford is following us. The troops in the F90s should arrive at least an hour before we do; I’ll have them turn that settlement inside out.’
‘If there’s anything there, they’ll find it.’ I checked the course in the data-tank. ‘Estimate we’ll get there inside two hours from now.’
I looked round the narrow, cramped cabin. The thrum of power vibrated through the metal walls; and figures changed constantly in the ’tank, feeding in navigation details, bright in the dim light. Tension made a hard knot in my chest, and I thought, Do we dare hope? Oh yes: in the face of all the evidence!
And I turned my head briefly to look down at the door of that closed cabin, behind which lies the body of amari Ruric Orhlandis, Ruric Hexenmeister. When I am in the Tower, when I inherit her memories with the memories of others who were Hexenmeister, then I’ll know – if she ever forgave me for coming here: s’aranthi, offworlder, human. Is that a petty consideration, in this clash of worlds? Yes: but I can’t comprehend worlds, only her.
Silence.
Cory’s head came up, I had time to think, What’s missing? and realize that the hiss of comlink interference no longer filled this cabin; and the transmission broke through clearly –
‘– massive power-discharge! All craft out of area; repeat, out of the area –’
Alarms blared. The satellite-image in the holotank cut out for a split second. It refocused: the pattern of heat-sensor readings leaping wildly. And then all in a minute became still.
Corazon Mendez looked in blank disbelief at the hologram-images.
Lights flashed on the comlink console, and transmissions blared, frantic voices overriding each other with questions, and each voice sounded with no distortion: clear and complete, in the silence.
Earth turns, faster than we travel.
The dawn line raced across the sea, passing us, leaving in its wake fire and foam, and the morning white and gold. The Company shuttle flew low now, at ten thousand feet. The images in the holotank showed storm clouds massing along the southern horizon.
And over that horizon, in the heart of the southern continent that the Witchbreed called Elansiir, weather patterns are shifting out of constrictions they have endured for millennia, and now endure no longer.
Is it hours or seconds that pass?
The shuttle cabin grew hot; loud with the transmissions coming from other shuttles, from the base nine hundred miles away on Kumiel Island, from the Company station in its earth-circling orbit. Corazon Mendez left her seat and took the pilot’s place; the routine of flight needing all her concentration now; and the officer came to stand beside me where I stared down into the holotank. Visual images: clear and precise.
Flying south, to the Desert Coast.
We came in over the sea, casting a moving shadow on the blue water. The wide dome of the sky was azure, and thick with white daystars; and on the southern horizon clouds began to rise up into the stratosphere.
Some things are too big to be seen: I had been staring for whole minutes before I saw that here there was no skylined chiruzeth spire. The blue-grey of the Rasrhe-y-Meluur gone – and then the shuttle dipped low, and we passed over titanic ruins: the deep ocean itself not sufficient to cover them. Deep green water washed over chiruzeth that is splintered, tumbled like an avalanche into the sea covering the continental shelf.
A very few minutes after that, the shuttle reached land.
Walls breached, buildings shattered: the floodwater of those vast tidal waves still washes through the harbour of Kasabaarde. We are too high to see more than moving specks, high above panic and terror and destruction. I thought dreamily, Earthquake waves, awed by the magnitude of such destruction; a destruction whose epicentre lay a little to the south. Dust still hung in the stratosphere, dispersing slowly. And below –
Now there is no trade-quarter, those ramshackle buildings are gone, and the jath ships driven on to rocks or into deep water. Now there is no inner city, those white domes turned to powder.
And where the Tower stood is a crater, quarter of a mile across and eight hundred feet deep; sensors in this ship perceiving through a haze of pulverised rock no life, no recognisable structure, no stone upon stone left standing.
Because we have entered the city, a wasteland will grow here. Because we have entered the city, great ones will go to corruption. We are the bringers of death. Go you and cry: we are dead and come to corruption, in this resurgence of that ancient light.
By noon, a raw wind was blowing. The sky cleared, bright and daystarred, and the wind blew in gusts that tugged at the grounded shuttlecraft, and shook it where it rested on the rocky earth.
The dome of the sky shone clear above me, and Carrick’s Star dazzled from other shuttles a little way off. Dust skirled. The diggers in Company uniforms rested on the haft of the machine, swore, and then manoeuvred it back to carving a slit trench in the ground.
I rested, leaning on my stick, and the wind tugged at me. All around stretches the barren rock and earth of the Desert Coast, a glint of sea there between low hills; and there, in the west, the sky that should hold the chiruzeth pinnacle of the Rasrhe-y-Meluur, and that sky is empty now. And at my feet, shrouded for a burial which is not the custom of her people, lies amari Ruric Orhlandis, Ruric Hexenmeister. And the wind blows.
No, I thought fiercely, not your failure. If this hadn’t happened in your lifetime it would have been in someone else’s; no one should have to take decisions like these! There are no all-knowing, infallible authorities – not my people, and not Ortheans; and no, not even in the Tower.
Southward, the low hills of the Elansiir stand out distinctly, as if they stand out against a raw light.
The Company men backed the excavator out of the grave in a flurry of dust; and as they did so, I saw other people approaching from the shuttles. Corazon Mendez walked ahead of the others, carrying herself stiffly, and at her shoulder came Doug Clifford, speaking in a furious undertone that as he halted burst into speech: ‘If not for your ships firing, your provocation, this would never have happened!’
The Peace Force commander swung round on him, her face drawn, and said incredulously, ‘Provocation! I couldn’t let Company personnel be fired on and do nothing. Your business is to keep the situation from getting to that stage, envoy; why didn’t you?’
‘Don’t –’ It isn’t right that we should argue over a grave as if it were offal we’re burying!
They fell silent. Closer to the shuttles there were guards, and I squinted against the sun, and saw a dark Orthean male amongst them; realized then that Pathrey Shanataru must still have been on Kumiel, and would have been brought here by Doug, and what does it matter, now? If we learn the names of whatever Harantish Ortheans brought Trade technology into the city of Kasabaarde; and exactly what kind of equipment it was; does it matter?
Another Orthean walked past the guards, crossing the stretch of rocky earth between the shuttles and this makeshift grave. Walking in the raw air, eyes veiled against noon: a male with a yellow mane, in mercenary’s gear, and with harur-blades, and with a face half masked by the scar of an old burn … Blaize Meduenin stopped, and glanced down at her shrouded body.
‘You should give her the passing of fire,’ he said, ‘it’s
the custom of the Hundred Thousand.’
Noon shadow pooled blackly at his feet. I reached out a hand but he stepped back. That scarred face turns to the sky, as if he can see past daystars to inhabited worlds, to the worlds of the Heart Stars and the Home Stars, to Earth. As if he can feel urgent voices on WEBcasts, recriminations already beginning …
‘You can leave worlds behind you,’ he said. ‘Where can we go, who can’t leave this earth and live?’ His face twisted with disgust.
Doug Clifford interrupted: ‘You’re as much to blame for this as any of us, T’An; you fought the hiyeks!’
The light on the horizon is silver: older than time.
‘No, don’t – please –’
The noon sun of Carrick V shines down with a radiance that is fragile and bright and powerless; shines down on Ortheans, Envoy, Representative, Commander; who stand as if this is a ritual that we must conclude.
Our quarrelling voices rise over this barren land, and the unfilled grave where scavengers already gather.
THE END
APPENDICES AND MAPS
APPENDIX 1
Glossary
Ai-Telestre – literally the Hundred Thousand, traditionally all the telestres existing between the Wall of the World in the north, the Inner Sea in the south, the Eastern Sea, and the Glittering Plain to the west. Unified by Kerys Founder after the fall of the Golden Empire.
amari – ‘born of no mother; motherless’. A term used in the Hundred Thousand, referring to a child born of a non-telestre mother (and usually a telestre father; but possibly adopted n’ri n’suth). The child is motherless in the sense that it is not of the earth of the Hundred Thousand; thus the amari are always slightly feared or shunned, since a different inflection can make this mean ‘without the (mother) Goddess.’ It has both a descriptive and a condemnatory use.
arniac – a small shrub that grows in the infertile soil of the Desert Coast. Broad red leaves, black berries, growing to a height of half a metre. The leaf when dried is used to make herb-tea, and the berries are a cure for headaches and fevers.
arykei – literally ‘bed-friend’, lover, pair-bond (in some rarer cases, a triple or quadruple bond occurs). Given that the care of children in the telestre is communal, the arykei relationship is not child-based, but depends on mutual temporary or long-term attraction.
ashiren – a child, nominally under fourteen; literally one who has not yet attained adult gender. Diminutive: ashiren-te.
ashirenin – one permanently ashiren, one who does not change to adult gender at age 13–15 but remains neuter. Change then occurs between the ages of 30 and 35, and invariably results in death. The ashirenin are rare, said to have strange qualities for good or ill. Most famous of the ashirenin is Beth’ru-elen.
ataile – tough-leafed herb growing mostly in Melkathi and the Rimon and Ymirian hills. When chewed, the leaves produce a mildly narcotic effect, and are addictive.
becamil – the webweaver-beetle, giving its name to the tough multi-coloured waterproof fabric spun from its web. Hives are kept commercially all over the Hundred Thousand.
Beth’ru-elen – called Beth’ru-elen Ashirenin, a latent Orthean who died at 35 during late change to female. Reformer and revolutionary. During exile from Morvren Freeport spent time in Kasabaarde’s inner city, formulated the philosophical and religious insights that led to the reformation of the church of the Goddess. Later became s’ an of one of the six founding telestres of Peir-Dadeni: the n’ri n’suth line is still in existence.
brennior – large quadruped used as draught-beast in the Desert regions. Sand coloured, thick hide, tri-padded foot, tailless. Short flexible snout. Poor sight, good hearing. Omnivore.
Brown Tower – home of the Hexenmeister in Kasabaarde’s inner city. Founded some ten thousand years ago on the ruins of an Eldest Empire settlement, for the preservation of knowledge. Most of the underground installations are defunct, though it is still said to have connections with the Rasrhe-y-Meluur and the ruins under the Elansiir. One of the two sole remaining instances of viable Golden technology.
chirith-goyen – or clothworm, the fibre-spinning larvae of the chirith-goyen fly. The fibre is woven into a light fabric throughout the Hundred Thousand, and is easily dyed.
chiruzeth – a substance created either by the Golden Witchbreed, or by their predecessors. It has been described as a semi-sentient crystal, manipulated by mental energy; and as a substance in some way analogous to human DNA/RNA. Techniques for altering it from its present inert form have been lost.
dekany – tuberous weed found in shallow waters of the Inner Sea; useful for rope-fibre but not for much else.
del’ri – staple crop of the Desert Coast, a bamboo-like plant with edible seed in the knobbled stems. Pale green, growing to a height of 2–2½ metres. Harvested twice a year.
Desert Coast – general name given to that part of the southern continent that borders on the Inner Sea, and to the various ports and city-states there. Cut off from the wastelands of the interior by the Elansiir mountain range.
Earthspeaker – sometimes called the Landless. An office held by the members of the church of the Goddess after their training at the theocratic houses. They travel the Hundred Thousand, giving up their own telestres, and acting in a multitude of roles which may include priest, agrarian advisor, psychologist, healer, etc. The extent of their authority is impossible to define.
Emperor-in-Exile – hereditary ruler of Kel Harantish, chosen from the lineal half-breed descendants of Santhendor’lin-sandru’s imperial dynasty. A tyrant with absolute authority in Harantish’s highly-structured society. Claims the ancient right of ruling both northern and southern continents as the Golden Empire did.
fenborn – aboriginal race of Carrick V, now reduced in number and confined mainly to settlements in the Greater and Lesser Fens. Oviparous night-hunters living in stone-age culture. In the past carried out raids of considerable ferocity on north Rimon and Roehmonde, but have remained within the fen-borders since Galen Honeymouth’s treaty with them some two hundred years ago.
Fens – the Greater and Lesser Fens: marsh and fenland covering two thousand square miles, paralleling the Wall of the World and separating the provinces of Roehmonde (to which it is comparable in size) and Peir-Dadeni. Not least among the dangerous fauna are the fenborn.
ferrorn – see ochmir appendix.
galeni – a term used by the aboriginal Orthean species, the fenborn, to refer to that humanoid race now more generally regarded as ‘Ortheans’ (who are the product of genetic engineering, cross-breeding fenborn and the Golden Witchbreed). Galeni derives from the first T’An Suthai-Telestre to ensure the Greater and Lesser Fens were regarded as fenborn territory, the T’An Galen Kerys-Andrethe, called Galen Honeymouth.
Goddess – sometimes referred to as the Mother or the Sunmother, or occasionally the Wellmother. A sun and earth deity. The church was designed and set up by Kerys Founder as an anti-technology device after the fall of the Witchbreed. It was later transformed by Beth’ru-elen Ashirenin into a genuine religious movement. Now more of a philosophical discipline including a reverence for all life, and a recognition of reincarnation. They hold that their spirits pass through many bodies, reuniting in death with the fire of the Goddess (‘fire’ and ‘spirit’ have the same root-word in most Orthean languages); the main heresy holds that this is merely genetically inherited memory – possibly why the Hexenmeister is regarded with such deep distrust.
Golden Empire – the five-thousand-year rule of the Witchbreed race, under whose autocratic rule the two continents enjoyed peace, prosperity, and total slavery. Ended by Thel Siawn’s infertility virus, which gave rise to a war that devastated most of the southern continent, left the cities and land north of the Wall of the World in ruins, and is still visible in the transformation of Eriel to the Glittering Plain.
hanelys – commonly called tanglebush, a plant propagating itself by runners; 2–3 metres high, stems very hard black fibres with
long thorns, yellow leaves during Hanys and Merrum, and small orange fruit in Stathern.
harur-nilgiri, harur-nazari – traditional paired blades, the former a kind of short rapier, the latter a kind of long knife. Used ambidextrously. Common throughout the Hundred Thousand.
Hexenmeister – ruler of Kasabaarde, guardian of stored knowledge, and a sequentially immortal personality. Head of an information-gathering network that spans two continents.
hiyannek – term of endearment on the Desert Coast, ‘best blood’, that is, best-descended.
hiyek – translated literally as ‘bloodline’, in the sense of family or lineage. The hiyek is the matrilineal-descent family upon which Desert Coast society is structured; and given their dependence on the canal system, it is perhaps not surprising that the root-word can also be translated as ‘water’. Blood is understood to be the carrier of past-memories within individual bloodlines. Whether this means that Coast Ortheans assume themselves reborn within the same bloodline, or only allow themselves memories that reinforce this concept, is unclear. A drug used to access these memories, keretnen-hiyek, can thus be translated either as ‘Blood of Memory’ or ‘Water of Truth’.
hura – species of hard-shelled water clam found in rivers throughout the Hundred Thousand.
jath – double-masted, ocean-going vessel, usually with lateen sails; design originating in Morvren Freeport.
jath-rai – single-masted small coaster or fishing boat.
K’Ai Kezrian-kezriakor – a Harantish term translating as ‘Emperor/Empress-in-Exile’, applied to the descendants (or supposed descendants) of Santhendor’lin-sandru, the Last Emperor of the Golden Witchbreed. The K’Ai Kezrian-kezriakor rules the settlement Kel Harantish, and the canal system upon which the hiyek-families depend for their survival. The ‘exile’ referred to is from the territory covered by the Golden Empire: the northern and southern continental land-masses. Abbreviation: K’Ai, Empress/Emperor.
