Seeing it now filled Nien’s chest with joy and warmth. It was perfect.
“One more thing,” Lant said. “This begins a new tradition in the Cant. It’s a position that has already been assumed by someone who has, for far too long, been unrecognized. I mean this shoulder mantle to be worn by my First, the Leader of the Cant.”
The room waited for Lant’s words to register with Nien.
Nien’s throat tightened, he started to speak, stopped, and finally laughed unable to contain either the gratitude or the burden of it. The room laughed with him, breaking into applause. Those with glasses or mugs within reach began to raise them in salute.
As the room toasted their new Cant Leader, Nien’s gaze met Wing’s. Wing raised his glass to him. Nien reciprocated.
“Congratulations,” Lant said.
“Thank you, Commander.”
The two bumped their glasses and as Nien sat down with the leather shoulder mantle lying across his knees, it didn’t matter what fate the Council decided for him tomorrow. Tonight was his, here with Lant, Wing and Carly, and his closest friends. Tonight, this moment, they could never take away from him even if they took the rest of it tomorrow.
Cradling his mug like a child’s face, Nien thought, Yosha, it’s good to be home.
Chapter 34
Revelations
T hree days later, the festival ended, Nien made his way home with the family before setting out to look for Wing. He’d not seen him since the night at Lant’s and was anxious to finally speak with his brother alone. He found Wing in the fields and for the first time in more than a couple revolutions the two worked the fields together until dark.
“So,” Wing asked. “What happened with the Council?”
“So far it’s been a real non-event — but they’ve not had an official meeting until today, so…”
The brothers shrugged at each other.
“Let’s eat,” Nien said. “Much longer out here and I’ll be elbowing out the plow team for a go at the oat bucket.”
Back in the house the family had already retired so the boys threw together a cold supper and sank to the family room floor.
“It’s about time,” Nien said, his words muffled through the food in his mouth. Wing’s eyes flashed the hint of a question and Nien said, “I’ve been wanting to talk with you since I left Quieness.”
“Just since then?” Wing replied, feigning insult.
“I really did miss you in Quieness — especially at the end. But there’s a lot there I’ll miss, too. Like the people. One in particular.”
“A girl?”
“What else?” Nien replied with a quick grin. “Her name is Necassa. She works at the library where I studied. She helped me find a place to stay.” He paused. “She didn’t just show me her world, she showed me how to get inside of it.”
“Did you love her?”
“E’te, but that would not be all of it, you know? I think my feelings were wrapped too tightly in the whole experience. How genuine could it have been?”
“How did you leave it with her?”
“It was awkward. Sad.”
“I’m sorry,” Wing said.
“The last time we were together I remember looking down at the street far below me as she walked away. I felt so alone — and I guess that’s when I realized that it wasn’t her, and it wasn’t the city, but that I simply didn’t belong there. From my small window, I could see all the way out to the Royal Palaces. They’re quite a ways out of the city, but you can’t miss them. The sight of them was as ‘at home’ as I felt in Quieness — how strange is that?” Nien paused on the realization. “But that’s just where the oddity began. I mean, every day I would see other Preaks. There are hundreds of thousands that live in Cao and yet I felt more alien among them than I did with the Quienans or the Honj. I learned a great deal, but I don’t know that I am much the wiser.”
“I doubt that.”
“No,” Nien said with easy acceptance, “truly. I’m afraid that little trip of mine landed me squarely back here in your field of expertise.”
Wing’s eyebrows furrowed. “My field? There are no answers grown there, Deviant. Only questions.”
“And that’s exactly what I need now.”
Wing gave him a puzzled look.
“Don’t you find it strange how the world works through us and sometimes despite us to bring us to a place where we’re finally ready to listen?”
Wing was twirling a piece of hair around his finger — a familiar mannerism when he was contemplative, or worried.
“What?” Nien asked.
“What?”
Nien nodded at Wing’s hand as he wound the chunk of hair tighter around his finger. Wing released the hair.
“You would think the last thing I’d gone to Quieness to study would be works on theology.”
“I would have imagined so,” Wing acknowledged.
“Well, I ended up studying not only the Ancient Writings there, but the records of nearly every other valley that had something written on their beliefs.” Wing was watching him intently. “I tell you, it was as if these books would follow me around — if I hadn’t picked them up, they would have tailed me back to my apartment. What began as some cosmic annoyance took over every intent and nearly every thought I had there.” Nien took a breath and ran his hand over his head. “Here’s the thing, in my reading I kept finding common themes, and I started to wonder: what if they are all talking about the same thing, and if that’s the case, doesn’t that change everything?”
“Yes,” Wing said, his voice soft, full of emotion, “everything. It takes away the very premise of our isolation.”
Nien looked his brother over. “You don’t seem very surprised by this.”
For once, Wing did not avert his gaze. “No.”
“You’ve thought about this before?”
“Yes.”
“So that’s why it feels like you’re patting me on the head.”
“No. I’m just…happy.”
“Don’t drop the reins, Wing. Tell me what you’re thinking or you’ll make me crazy.”
“I’m happy that you know.”
“That I know...?”
“That they are all talking about the same thing.”
“They?”
“Yes — they, we,” Wing replied.
“As in all these religions, all these races, not just you and me,” Nien said, trying to clarify.
Wing nodded.
“So, I really am just catching on.”
“Well, maybe. A little.”
“All right.” Nien conceded. “So how long have you believed this?”
Wing was silent for a time. He then reached behind him and grabbed his personal copy of the Ancient Writings. Flipping the book open, he turned to a page near the beginning and said, “Here the prophet writes: ‘Merehr fled out of his own land from a desolating scourge and sojourned in a strange land. And as I watched I became aware that this was the Leader of Legend that the prophets before me had spoken of.’ ” He glanced up at Nien. “There are passages like this throughout the Writings that have led us to believe they are talking about the same person.”
“Led us to believe?” Nien asked. “Isn’t it obvious?”
“Then who is this?” And Wing read three more passages, each from a different book of the Poets, each using a different appellation. Wing ticked them off on his fingers after he’d read the verses: “Immortal Promise, Believer, and from the Poet Eneefa, Distant Star.”
“Wing, all of those are simply other words for Merehr, the Leader of Legend. After all, those titles are all in the Poets — you know, prophets being poetic.”
“I know,” Wing said. “And what if that’s the only reason they were left unchanged? For in every book that is not of the Poets, it reads: Merehr.”
“Unchanged?” Nien took a breath. “Wing, you do know what you’re saying?”
Wing looked at him.
“Yosha,” Nien swore. “You�
�re saying we — our ancestors — changed the Ancient Writings purposefully?”
“I don’t know. Right now, I’m only asking the question. You did say questions were what you were looking for.”
Wing’s expression did nothing to settle Nien’s stomach.
“A lot changes with translation of any kind,” Nien said, almost stumbling over his words. “And a translation as laborious as the Ancient Writings must have been — ?”
“I’ve taken that into account,” Wing said.
“How long has it been since you’ve suspected?” Nien asked.
“A long time ago, after the Council came out to talk to mother and fa when I was a child,” Wing said. He shifted uncomfortably. “More important, however, are the questions behind the question: With the exception of the Poets, if the appellations in the rest of the Writings were changed — why? Perhaps they saw changing every mention of the Leader to our Rieevan word, Merehr, as simply part of their translation. But what if that wasn’t the reason? What if there was some other reason? Some dramatic event that could have caused them to alter the Writings in order to make us believe that the Leader of Legend is Rieevan?”
“Maybe it was just an over-developed sense of self-righteousness?” Nien quipped.
“That’s crossed my mind,” Wing said in seriousness. “But if it was so important for our people to believe that the Leader will be of Rieevan blood, then why even include the books of foreign prophets?”
“Well, because such a thing would add weight to the Rieevan claim on the prophecy.”
“Exactly,” Wing said.
Nien laughed out an expletive. “Bleekla, Wing, this is...”
The brothers matched each other’s gazes. There was a deep haunting in Wing’s eyes.
To that look, Nien said quietly, “Our questions are dismantling our lives.”
Wing’s eyebrows rose slightly as if to say: Welcome to the fields my mind plows.
Shaking his head, Nien said, “Well, none of this will make any difference to the Council. All we have here are feelings and guesswork. Not exactly substantial offerings. They’ll still see you as Merehr.” In Wing’s eyes, Nien could see his own besetment mirrored — and something else. “What is it?”
Wing was silent, his eyes distant.
Nien waited, trying to be patient.
“The, uh...” Wing began.
“The dream?”
“The vision, Nien. Real, and worse than any nightmare.”
“You’ve never told me what it is you see,” Nien said, his voice still in the faint light emanating from the lantern.
“I think that the Prophet-Poets, more so than the Writers, wrote in poetic verse because it was the only way to describe what they saw and felt. Though their predictions are bloody, violent, and dark — unlike anything I could even imagine — in the vision they are real.”
A coldness settled in Nien’s gut as he let Wing continue.
“I’ve seen the destruction, Nien. The devastation they wrote of.”
“You saw death? Was it of us? Of our people?”
“Of many people. More than that I cannot tell you.” Wing’s voice had grown threadbare. “But what I’ve seen — is it too late? Can I change that vision? Can it be different? Did I see only one possible outcome — the one the Prophet Writer or Poet themselves saw?” His head bowed. “Every time I reach for these answers, they slip from my grasp. All I have is this feeling. I have nothing to validate it.” There was a pause, then Wing continued. “As long as our people ignore that the Ancient Writings were written not only by Rieevans but by men and women from other valleys — even far distant valleys — they will never be able to accept that there may be discrepancies in our translation, and that some ideas, some thoughts, cannot be translated at all. Metaphors are slippery, Nien. Meant to convey that which is unspeakable. Interpreting them literally is dangerous.”
“If what you’ve been saying is remotely true, it’s far worse than that — we’re basing our whole way of life on a translation that is at best incomplete, at worst purposefully a lie.” Nien’s eyes narrowed and looked almost black in the dimming lantern light. He could hardly believe what he was saying. “How long have you known all this?”
“A long time,” Wing replied.
For more than a few revolutions before he had left for Quieness Nien had felt a distance between himself and his brother, a distance that Wing had placed not only between them but also between himself and everyone. Now Wing had crossed that distance back to him and Nien knew he’d stumbled upon the heavy burden that Wing had never been able to share.
Briefly caught up in the disquieting epiphany, Nien suddenly understood the beleaguered dichotomy of his brother’s world: Wing was twilight and dusk, sunlight and shadow, warm wood and chilly spring. He was what their people needed and nothing like what they were looking for.
How could I have been so blind? Nien thought. In all of my learning, here with him, I am ignorant.
“Wing, I...I’m so sorry for what I said when I left for Quieness, about you not saying something, not standing up for yourself.”
Nien had expected Wing to cut him off, to quickly say it was all right as he always did.
He was shocked when Wing said instead, “Nien, I have tried, so many times, in so many ways, to speak to the Council. To say something. But they twist my words. They see in them what I don’t intend and invent the rest. Until I say exactly what they want me to say, they will never hear me.” Wing took a pained breath. “It could be that on my word they would agree to an alliance with the other valleys.” Wing hesitated. “If I believed that would be the outcome, I might try.” Wing was clearly having a very difficult time saying what he had to. “However, I don’t trust such an outcome. What if…?”
“What if you step up as Merehr and they decide that the Cant as well as an alliance with the other valleys is irrelevant.”
Wing nodded.
“Bleekla — you think their belief in Merehr is that strong?”
“I believe their fear of the other valleys is that strong.”
Nien sighed. Wing was right, of course. “Why is it you never shared any of this with me before?”
“With anyone.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s pointless to do so unless you know the one you’re talking to already understands.”
Nien rolled his eyes in mock exasperation. “Great.”
“Now,” Wing said. “Will you let me apologize?”
“For what?”
“What I said about you running away. I think it took courage — a lot of courage — to do what you did. I don’t think you were running away. I think you were taking advantage of an opportunity. The truth was, I didn’t want you to leave.”
Nien looked Wing over. His brother’s sincerity filled him with compassion from belly to brain.
“I guess I knew that,” he said. “I just wanted some peace. I wanted you to have some peace while I was gone...”
Wing laughed. “That was your way of trying to protect me?” He shook his head. “You really are a bit of an idiot. The time you were gone was possibly the worst of my life.”
Nien swallowed. He felt horrible. But of course everything would have gotten worse for Wing in his absence. How could he not have seen that?
Because I wanted to go anyway, he knew.
“I’m sorry, Wing. I really am.”
“It’s all right, Nien. You needed to go. I’m glad you did. I’m also very glad you came back.”
Nien smiled back at Wing. “The Quienans may be a very practical people, they may not believe in the Ancient Writings as we do, but I saw much goodness there. I saw great beauty. I became stronger. I became a better person. When the whole is hidden, how can one know what part he has chosen?” He pushed aside his plate. “But I have a much better idea now. I know now, for myself, so many things I could only guess at before. I’m Rieevan. I’m Nien Cawutt. I want to be here with you, with our family.”
The look in Wing’s eyes was so pleased, so warm, Nien thought they could have eclipsed all of Quieness and every wondrous thing in the great city.
Yosha, it really was good to be home.
He tipped his head at Wing. “Mulled wine?”
“Yes,” Wing said. “Definitely.”
Nien got up and stirred the coals in the cooking stove, setting the metal crock of spiced wine on the smooth black surface.
Once the wine was heated he poured two mugs, set one in his brother’s hand, and sat down on the floor again knowing that, in all the world, there was no place he would rather be.
Chapter 35
Into the Pass
“J ason will be going with the others to defend Jayak Pass.”
Call looked up at Monteray. The right sleeve of his uncle’s long robe hung empty, reminding Call of the fall his uncle had taken only days before that terminated with cracked ribs and a broken arm. These injuries would keep him from going with the militia.
“I want to go,” Call said.
“You’re too young. Anyway, the men would never let you,” Monteray replied.
“Where’s Jason now?”
“Heading into town.”
Call ran out his uncle’s front door. The length between him and his destination flew by under his feet.
More than a turn ago, merchants traveling from Majg reported that they’d seen movement in the mountains to the southing of their valley. In the past three days, men in town had received word that Ka’ull spies had been found in Jayak. There had also been a few sightings of the dark robed warriors in the lower half of Jayak Pass leading into Legran. Though not terribly organized, the Legran militia had decided to present a force inside the Pass.
All this was running through Call’s mind as he approached the large group of Legran militia gathering on the outskirts of town. It didn’t take him long to spot his brother at the center of them.
To his brother, Call heard one of the militia say: “The Jayakans will drive them into the Pass and from there right into Legran.”
Wing & Nien Page 28