by Trish Mercer
“‘Now that we finally know who our Quiet Man is, we wish to thank and congratulate you for your years of devoted service. We also now expect great things of you. Placed into your care, and for your training, is a young man of great promise, such as yourself—’”
Shem frowned. “They can’t be talking about Lemuel Thorne!”
“I think they may be,” the other man in green and brown said. “Onion cake?”
“Mushroom pudding,” Shem clarified.
“Just as bad.”
Shem continued reading. “‘—great promise . . . who we expect you to instruct and bring up as—’” Shem stopped reading, his mouth too dry to continue.
One of his companions completed the sentence. “‘. . . bring up as your replacement in Edge.’ Oh, Shem. I’m so sorry—”
“Not going to happen,” Shem whispered firmly. “They have no idea what’s really going on, nor will they. Ever.”
“Keep reading, Shem,” the other companion said gently.
Shem swallowed and finished the message. “‘Once the captain is fully trained, under your guidance, he will be ready to become one of us. And you will be sent to do even greater work—’”
He could barely say the next words out loud.
“‘—with Shin in Idumea’.”
One of the men let out a low whistle. “You’ve impressed someone, Shem Zenos! No signature.”
“Of course not!” said the other man. “What’d you expect? ‘All our love, Mr. Evil, Head of the Guarders’?”
Shem stared at the message.
“What are you going to do?” one of the men asked.
“Nothing,” Shem whispered.
“Nothing? Shem, do you realize what this is? Who it’s from?”
“No, not really,” he admitted. He handed it to one of the men. “You knew some of the handwritings—does this look familiar?”
The man sighed sadly. “Been waiting for years to be useful in that manner but . . . the hand is tight and forced, as if purposely trying to disguise the writing. Sorry, Shem. It’s not familiar to me at all.”
“It’s all right, Dormin. Was a long shot, anyway. Still pass it around, see if we get lucky. I’m sure it’s not General Thorne’s writing, but since it traveled through him, it’s reaffirmation of what we know about him.”
“True,” Dormin, the last son of King Oren nodded. “We’ll do our best. But Shem, you can’t ignore this.”
“I’m not,” he assured the men. “But I’ve been thinking: Thorne doesn’t know what’s in this message. He was only told he was to learn from me. But no one has specified what he’s supposed to learn, have they?”
Dormin and his companion looked at each other with knowing smiles.
“And they already trust me, so if Thorne fails to make any progress—whatever kind they’re looking for—the blame will be on him, not me. They’ll assume he’s failing in his duty, not the Quiet Man.”
The men’s smiles grew broader.
Shem began to grin as well. “The only thing left to do is to send our own message back. Something vague so as to not be dishonest, but something they’ll interpret as what they want to hear.”
“How about, ‘Message received, Quite Man understands’?” Dormin’s companion suggested.
Shem grinned. “Perfect! Can I leave the delivery of that to the two of you?”
“May take a few days to find a contact,” Dormin told him, “because they’re just reentering the forests again, but we can take care of it.”
“Good,” Shem said.
“Uh, Shem?” Dormin’s companion started hesitantly, “what about the other problem?”
Shem exhaled and rubbed his chin. “Working on it. Right now I’m just watching, but I have a feeling he won’t be as troublesome as we fear.”
“But he could be, Shem. Remember that; there’s a great deal that he knows, and someday he just might slip up.”
“Message received,” Shem said soberly. “Quiet Man understands. Well then, I suppose it’s time for me to get back and teach my recruits a thing or two about identifying Guarders.”
---
Mahrree was grateful to see Rector Yung coming up the road. She’d been sitting on the front porch with her children, thumbing through a collection of old army books, setting some out to sit overnight to try to remove some of their musty smell before they were donated to the fort.
But what they were really doing was avoiding the house. Something had died in there.
It wasn’t just the wilting flowers that gave the effect—flowers that Mahrree intended to throw out into the front garden before bed. But it was the heavy mood that accompanied Perrin when he lifted out High General Shin’s sword. They all felt it, and they all avoided talking about it. Perrin still hadn’t come back down, and Mahrree hadn’t dared to go upstairs.
Rector Yung turned at their gate and came up the walk, looking at the dying flowers. “Was lovely at first,” he said softly. “But now . . . maybe not such a good idea.”
“It’s all right,” Mahrree assured him. “My neighbors across the road were going to let their goat in here in the morning to clear it all out.”
Yung nodded and stopped on the stairs to evaluate the dozens of books laid out as if on display. “From the Shins?” he asked reverently.
Mahrree nodded, Jaytsy sniffed, and Peto cleared his throat.
Mahrree looked deliberately at her children and said, “Would the two of you see what else is in the crate while I chat with the rector?”
There was nothing left in the crate—they’d unloaded the rest of the books, Relf’s old uniforms, and Joriana’s hats already—but her children knew how to take a hint.
After they had gone into the house, Mahrree sat on a step and patted next to her for Yung to sit down.
“How is he?” the rector asked as he joined her.
“Surprisingly well, considering.”
“Shem filled me in a bit on their little adventure to Idumea,” Yung confessed, and gave her a significant look.
“So what did Perrin not share with me?”
Yung sighed, checked behind him to make sure the door was secure, and said, “Did he mention sedation?”
A while later Mahrree held her head in her hands, and Rector Yung patted her back in a grandfatherly way.
“He told me about half of all that,” she whispered to Yung. “And not so many details about what happened in the Conference Room. Or his reaction in the cellar. Or that it was Kuman. Kuman!” Her head snapped up. “He made my dress! Well, now I MUST let my mother slash it to shreds!”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Shin. I wrestled with my mind all afternoon if I should tell you all that Shem revealed to me. I certainly don’t want to step in between a husband and a wife, but when men like your husband experience all that he has—”
Mahrree turned to him. “What do you mean by that?”
Yung studied the stairs he sat on, thinking for the right words. “You said he seems to be doing surprisingly well. Mrs. Shin, I’ve been a rector for a very long time. I know men. Perrin shed a few tears, felt some comfort, and now that he’s home again he’s going to think it’s all over. He misses his parents, but believes he’s finished mourning. He hasn’t.”
Mahrree bobbed her head back and forth. “Well, of course not. When I lost my father, I went up and down for many moons, so I can—”
“You can relate, yes Mrs. Shin,” Yung cut her off gently and put a hand on her shoulder. “But he thinks he’s over it. I just want to warn you, when a man thinks he’s over something, he refuses to deal effectively with it when it rears up again and surprises him.”
Mahrree’s shoulders sagged. “What does that mean, exactly?”
“Men in the army deal with violence and death frequently, and know that on any day they may face it. That creates a heightened state of alertness. Does your husband ever seem tense?”
Mahrree scoffed. “A better question would be, does he ever seem not to be tense?”
> Yung nodded slowly. “A mind can handle only so much of that, Mrs. Shin, and only for so long. Something like this can . . . push him too far.”
“Meaning?” She was starting to grow anxious.
And Yung could tell. With great compassion in his eyes he said, “This might be the berry that breaks the bear.”
Completely bewildered she asked, “What in the world are you talking about?”
Yung frowned. “They don’t have that expression here?”
Mahrree’s blank look answered that question.
“Guess it’s a Flax and Waves story,” said Yung apologetically. “You see, years ago some teenagers went to the berry fields near the edge of a forest. The wild blackberries were ripe and they went to have a little feast and enjoy the sunshine. Further down they noticed a bear, also enjoying the berries and the sun, but far enough away that the bear didn’t pay them any attention. During the course of the afternoon, the teens and the bear drew closer together, until one of the young men decided to toss a berry at the bear. He hit the animal on his back which didn’t bother him.
“Well, you know young men: it became a contest, and despite the warnings of the girls they were trying to impress, three boys tossed more and more berries at the bear, a few even hitting him on the snout, which made him snarl briefly, but wasn’t enough to distract him from his gorging.
“Until one young man hit the bear in the eye. Something in that massive, and—up to that point—harmless, beast snapped. He roared, lunged through the bushes, and attacked the first teenager he could reach: an innocent young woman who’d been trying to get the boys to stop. It was a battle after that, and eventually the teenagers beat off the bear with a variety of sticks and thrown rocks. The girl lived, but it took several moons for her leg to heal from the ravages of the bear, and she always walked with an obvious limp. It was that last berry that broke the bear.”
Mahrree nodded, understanding too much what Yung was trying to say. “But the world’s been throwing things much harder than berries at him for years.”
“I know,” Rector Yung said solemnly. “That’s why I’m worried for him, and for you. When a bear goes on a rampage, it doesn’t discriminate its victims. It goes for the closest and most convenient target.”
Mahrree swallowed. “Which would be me. Or the children.”
He patted her back again. “Then again, nothing might come of any of this. I may just be overly concerned.”
“And I appreciate it,” Mahrree told him. “You remind me of Perrin’s great uncle Hogal.”
Yung looked down. “I feel him there, in that house sometimes. As if he’s checking up on me, watching to make sure I’m continuing his work properly.”
“You are. You say what I think he’d say. That’s important now, since Perrin doesn’t have his great uncle, and now no longer has his fa—” The word seized in her throat. Just when she thought she was able to deal with it all, she was overwhelmed again.
Yung squeezed her shoulder and tenderly pulled her close as her tears dampened his shoulder, again.
---
That evening Shem stood listening outside the doors of the training arena, a cringe etching itself on his face.
“Mennn,” Beneff held out the word for three counts, “welcome to the Army . . . of Idumea, ho-ho,” he droned and paced.
“I’m so sorry,” Shem whispered, as if any of his ten recruits could hear him. Beneff had insisted on introducing himself to the men immediately, before Shem could take them out on their nighttime orientation ride.
In a way it would provide an interesting contrast, Shem The Optimist decided. The dullest experience of training, followed by the most terrifying.
“To-daaay,” Beneff continued, taking most of the evening to say the word, “we will begin . . . by learning . . . to care for . . . your horse, hum-hum.”
Beneff’s strange delivery was amusing for five minutes; beyond that it was agonizing. Maybe the soldiers were already asleep on their feet. If not, Master Sergeant Zenos would teach them how, out of kindness.
“For if . . . you take care of your horse . . . he or she—or it, snip-snip, ho-ho, as the unfortunate creature may be—will then care for you.”
Shem groaned. Beneff would take three hours to review something that took five minutes.
“First . . . the blanket. May be wool . . . may be cotton . . . may not be silk, may not be linen . . . may not be sheepskin, because we all know that there’s a reason why wheels aren’t square—”
At least the random bits of Beneff’s dubious wisdom should keep them somewhat alert, trying to puzzle out his meanings.
“Really, boys,” Shem whispered, “if there was anything else I dared have him do—”
“—may not be leather . . . may not be linen . . . I believe I mentioned that already, good to repeat, ho-hah—”
“That’s right,” Shem whispered, “ramble about nothing important so you say nothing revealing.”
Shem leaned against the wall. It was bad enough when he realized that a Thorne would be coming back with them to Edge, but then Beneff showed up. Shem was fairly confident Beneff was just an “old horse” no one in the army wanted, but didn’t have the heart to put out to pasture. Yet one could never be sure when someone who’d been predictable for years would suddenly remember his true nature.
After all, Shem had gone through the same training himself.
“At least I’m dealing with only two cats,” he whispered to himself. “One so young and inexperienced it doesn’t even know it’s a cat, and the other so old it can’t remember what it is. Both manageable, for now. But at some point,” he closed his eyes in dread, “they’re going to send in the mountain lions. And then?”
And then . . .
“What will Perrin think of me?”
---
Perrin sat on the bed for probably hours—he lost track of time. He stared at the wilting lilacs, now releasing a sickly decaying odor, as he slowly fingered the ornate hilt on the general’s sword.
It had been made in honor of the High General’s installment and presented to him after he made his oaths of fidelity and loyalty to King Oren. As far as Perrin knew, the gleaming steel blade had never been used in all those years. But that didn’t mean it couldn’t be. This was no decorative sword—not like the flimsy thing General Cush kept at his side as a symbol rather than as a weapon, and used to clean his fingernails when he thought no one was looking.
No, this sword, this masterpiece of metalwork and intricacy—the hilt was an elaborate mass of twisting steel and careful cutwork, called filling-gree by the swordsmith—no, this sword was made to be much more than a symbol or a piece of art.
It was meant to be used.
Perrin wasn’t sure why they’d sent it to him: as a promise for his future, out of pity for his loss, or as a taunting reminder why the previous owner no longer needed it. It didn’t matter.
He fingered the carefully twisted bits of shining steel and breathed in the stench of rotting flowers. He shouldn’t have been feeling this way, he knew. They were fine. He heard them, he felt them—he still felt them, burning constantly and quietly in his chest. They were fine in Paradise, with Hogal and Tabbit and countless others whose existence had graduated to the next life.
They were fine.
He had shed his tears, near to dehydration, before they reached Idumea. And then he buried them, and felt them, and they were fine.
So why did it hurt so much? Again? Still?
Yes, he’d miss them. Nothing would ever fully take their place in his life, but he was adaptable. Granted, he hated change—everyone does. But change happens, and you accept it, deal with it, rearrange your mind and soul in accordance with it, and you move on.
But he couldn’t move. He hadn’t moved for hours. He just sat there fingering the filling-gree.
After a while, he looked up in the darkening bedroom to see his sheathed sword leaning by the bedroom door, in precise position for him to strap it on in less t
han five seconds when the call came.
Eventually, he knew something he could do, a way he could move. He stood up, made his feet shuffle to his sword, and pulled it out of the sheath. Carefully he slipped it under the bed, between two of Mahrree’s storage crates.
Then he took the general’s sword and reverently slipped it into his sheath by the door.
And then . . .
. . . everything changed.
###
Sneak peek at Book 3, Falcon in the Barn
Eight weeks after the land tremor that shook the world, Jaytsy sat on her bed late at night with her knees pulled up to her chest. She slowly rocked, but didn’t dare go to sleep. There was a chance tonight would be quiet, but she’d had her sleep disturbed far too many times.
She knew it was self-centered to think so, but more and more she began to suspect that the shaking she had wished for everyone else, just to “wake them up a little,” had been focused primarily on her. While the world was looking more and more normal with all the rebuilding, nothing in Jaytsy’s world was the same.
Her grandparents were gone. And now, so was her father.
Perrin Shin’s body came home from his enraged ride to Idumea, but it was soon apparent his mind didn’t. Where it was most of the time, no one in their family really knew. All they knew was as soon as he put General Relf Shin’s sword into his sheath, everything changed.
It was the day after the crate had come from Idumea, the 55th Day of Planting, that he replaced his sword with his father’s. That night he tried to use it.
Jaytsy had been sleeping when she heard shouting upstairs. Panicked, she opened her door at the same time Peto opened his. They stared at each other across the dark gathering room, hearing their father yelling and their mother trying to calm him. He came running down the stairs, Relf’s sword drawn, and looked dimly at his children in the dark.
“Upstairs! Now! My bedroom! The only place you’ll be safe.”