by Dave Duncan
She spoke what she expected to be her epitaph. "Never. The world does not concern us. We renounce it, personally and collectively, to pursue knowledge for its own sake. We may neither meddle in events nor share our wisdom with others, and this has been our creed for more lifetimes than even we can number. Many a sister has perished in torment for refusing to advise a tyrant, knowing her death will be a sign to the people that their ruler is unworthy."
He met this defiance with a winsome, almost boyish smile. "And have not those same tyrants frequently discovered their enemies coming against them armed with perfect knowledge of their strengths and weaknesses?"
"Such has been recorded."
" 'Such has been recorded'! Is that the closest you can come to lying? You regularly testify for the Speakers."
"They are the only exception. Wisdom cannot flourish without peace and order. In criminal matters we provide evidence for those who judge in the name and by the laws of holy Demern."
"From now on, you and your seers will serve me instead."
"No." Fear swelled in her heart, for his mind was clotted blood and he planned worse than just her death.
Stralg smiled and departed.
Shortly thereafter he sent in some of his brutes and they took away five.
♦
The mangled bodies were returned the following morning, but of course every seer had seen what was being done in his camp during the night. He took away ten more. The Eldest knew by then that Stralg Hragson would wipe out the cult before he would yield.
Her only hope sprang from the blessing of her goddess, for she could feel the revulsion seething in the Werists who came each morning to return the corpses and drag away more victims. Twenty, then forty ... None of the bloodlord's men was as ruthless as he was, but the mutiny she prayed for failed to appear. Their rage was directed against her, for forcing them to perform such atrocities, and their loyalty to Stralg grew stronger, not weaker. On the fifth day they drove away eighty victims, but they also broke into the storerooms and took bales of priceless weavings, which they burned. Next morning, when most of the Witnesses remaining had collapsed in shock, the Eldest went out to him.
They met in a rainstorm in a field of mud stinking with blood and death, while his sullen host watched from the distance. The corpses of the eighty were being loaded into carts.
"So you value cloth more than life?" he mocked. "I must try burning buildings, too."
"We shall yield," she said, "partway."
His laughter was not pretense. "You will yield utterly, or die. Do you think I cannot double eighty, or burn your abbey around your ears?"
"Then you destroy us, for we shall lack the numbers to gather the knowledge you require."
He showed her his wolfish teeth. "If I cannot have it, no one shall. I will torch your storerooms today. Yield or die, old woman."
"Hear my terms. We shall answer your questions, but yours only. You do not want every warrior to be omnipotent."
His eyes narrowed as the evil mind behind them calculated. "That is true wisdom. But it takes many sixdays to send a message across the Face. So you will answer my hostleaders also. I promote only whom I trust. Them and myself."
"You and no more than four hostleaders." She felt his surge of triumph.
"And no one else!"
"No one else," she agreed. "And we keep our anonymity, our habits and veils. Our persons will not be harmed."
He shrugged his indifference, well pleased with what he had won. "Where is Hostleader Snirson and how many Werists does he have with him?"
"Snirson died of wounds a sixday ago. His host has scattered."
Stralg laughed again; he had known that.
"One other thing," the Eldest said. "We shall never volunteer information. We give true answers and nothing more."
He liked that less, for he was a clever man. The balance of his mind swung back toward death and horror. "Then you can aid my foes."
"I have said we shall not."
"By remaining silent you can aid them."
"To tell everything that may be relevant would take forever. Do you want sixty-sixty sisters babbling in your ears all day long? Ask if a man is a traitor and we shall tell you, but we shall not warn. Only holy Mayn knows all. Those are my terms. Accept them or slay us."
Stralg had hesitated, angrily weighing compromise against massacre. Then, impatient and flushed with victory, he had accepted her terms. He had never gotten around to imposing others, and while the concessions she had won were almost meaningless, she was probably the only person who had ever made that monster back up even a hairsbreadth.
So the vile bargain had been made. So an organization made up mostly of nosy old women had become the despot's sharpest weapon. Until Stralg, the Fist of Weru had been a figurehead with no practical authority over Werists outside his own city or district, and any previous bloodlord who had tried to widen his rule had died young. The seers had helped Stralg win supreme power over the whole Face, and they had helped him keep it, betraying countless rebels to his awful vengeance. Always the rationalization had been that they were biding their time until he could be overthrown, but that time had never come and never would until Stralg's black heart stopped beating.
The Eldest had made her decision long ago and to change it now would be to admit failure. She knew that mutiny smoldered under the ancient crust of obedience, but she must choose a successor who would follow the course she had mapped out, who would write the same story upon the next tablet. LeAmber, she decided, was the one. LeAmber was young, true, not even fifty yet, but she would do nothing foolish. She would wait out the bloodlord's death.
The alternative to LeAmber was Tranquility. Tranquility was older, but rash; she would raise up the Witnesses to defy Stralg and so risk everything. Tranquility's faction maintained that the evil was more than Stralg, that chthonic powers more dreadful than even Weru stood behind him, and the terrible thing he had built would live on even after he died. The Eldest had refused to accept that argument, for there was no evidence that the man's sister was a Chosen of Xaran. There never could be real evidence, and Maynists must deal in facts, not theories or pseudoprophecy.
The sunlight had moved. Her hand must come soon or be too late. The refectory was a blur now, as the shadows closed in. Most of her was dead already.
And yet... when there were no facts? If the gods refused certainty, then must not mortals sometimes act on partial knowledge, weighing possibilities and calculating uncertainties? If the Witnesses were ever to renege on their pact, then now was the time, for Stralg was aging, he was far away on the Florengian Face, still striving to conquer it as he had conquered Vigaelia. After fifteen years, success was souring into defeat. If LeAmber was wrong and Tranquility right, then now was the time to abrogate the treaty. Was this an eldest's legendary dying insight, or only the maundering of a dying crone? Had she been wrong all these years? Must humanity ever be stretched upon the same rack, with a succession of different sandals on the levers?
Softly the five of her hand had come. They gathered around in silence, kneeling by the bed, hands joined with hers for comfort, and she knew them: Rose, Indigo, Carillon, Cinnamon, and Willowbark. Two of them were almost as old as herself, while Willowbark was barely forty. They were united in their grief. Sorrow poured through their union until the Eldest's blind old eyes filled with tears. They shared the pain, knowing that her essence now was death.
"Can you speak, Mother?" Rose whispered. "Have you some special word for us? Will the lady of Wisdom speak with your final breath?"
Of course she would! The Eldest wondered how she could not have realized sooner that she had a message to pass on. "A weft," she said, "tonight, a weft!" She felt their dismay when they could not see what was so plain to her.
In any attempt to explain to extrinsics how they sensed the world, Maynists were forced to speak in metaphor. They spoke of weaving, of mosaics, of patterns. They talked of nodes, of cusps, of subtle touches on the tiller by whi
ch the gods steered the world—the single snowflake that could launch an avalanche, the sensual moment when a husband turned to his wife in the quiet of the night and sired a great teacher or a monster, while on some other night she might have conceived a different child for him. They took special delight in identifying what they termed a weft, by which they meant an important event, action, or decision that ultimately produced results contrary to its original intent. The analogy, of course, was to the weft thread in a weaving, which turns at the edge and goes back in the opposite direction to make the pattern.
Rose said, "Tonight? What is its nature?"
"She is leaving!" The Eldest struggled and found enough breath to whisper, "His sister... going to ... Tryfors ..."
"Sister? But where did this weft occur, Mother? Tell us!"
Why could they not see for themselves? "Skjar."
Ripples of content... No matter how important this weft, Skjar was too distant for any Witness here in Bergashamm to scent it. But the local chapter would send in its report and the data would be woven into the history so that all could know. The incident must be great indeed if the lady of wisdom Herself deemed it worthy of mention.
The Eldest sensed another presence. The Ancient One had come for her, and it was time to go.
"We are humbled and will record it, Mother." That was Cinnamon, pushing herself forward as usual. "But who will be Her voice to us from now on? Say the name, Mother! Who will be our new Eldest?"
LeAmber, and keep the covenant? Wait for the tyrant to fall?
Or Tranquility? Warn them of the greater darkness behind Stralg? Tranquility's faction would provoke the tyrant's wrath. Must the Eldest admit that she had been wrong all her life? No, not that. That weft tonight would' save her from that shame.
"LeAmber," she whispered.
She felt their anger and dismay like physical blows.
How dare they question her and delay her here when she must be gone? How could they not sense that the Old One was standing over them, waiting for her?
"Did you say 'LeAmber,' Mother?"
Yes. They would feel her insistence. Of course it must be LeAmber! The compact must be preserved.
Now she could go. Now she had done. Relieved at last of her burdens, Witness Raven, the Eldest, sank into the gentle arms of the mother.
five
FRENA WIGSON
was driving her chariot down a long hillside, hooves drumming, wheels bouncing, axle squealing, leather floor squeaking. She clutched the reins in one hand and the rail in the other and let her knees absorb whatever jostling and bouncing was not stopped by the webbing. That was the theory; in practice she was going up and down like laundry in a water trough. The wheels leaped from ridge to ridge and the wind whirled her hair like a flag. Exhilaration!
"What village is that ahead?" She had to shout very loud.
Verk yelled back, "Bitterfeld, mistress. A very forgettable place."
There were few things more enjoyable in life than driving a pair of strong young onagers on a fine morning and letting the wind blow your hair around—assuming you had hair suitable for the purpose—but it was not the best situation for conversation. On a smooth track, yes, but there was no real track at all through these hills. Travel was very educational.
Her companion was Verk, her father's senior guard. His big hand grasped the rail without a single white knuckle and he held himself rock-steady with no visible effort except the rhythmic flexing of the muscle in his forearm.
"Tell her she's driving too fast!" Uls howled from the other chariot, close behind. If he remained farther back, he would not have to breathe Frena's dust, but Uls was not the sharpest sword in Skjar and he invariably stayed closer to Verk than his shadow. The brothers were so alike that nobody could tell them apart—as long as neither spoke. After that it was easy.
"Am I driving too fast?" she said.
"Dark and Night are enjoying the run," Verk said. "If you do not let them get overheated, they will come to no harm."
He was being tactful, because Frena had no practical way of reducing speed at the moment. Pulling back on the reins would frighten the onagers and hurt their mouths. She lacked the strength to do any good with the brake lever and would certainly not ask Verk for help. But Dark and Night were as sure-footed as ibexes, and the car had been specially made for her by the best wheelwright in Skjar.
Here the stony hills opened up to cup a valley, bottomed with scabby grain fields. She did not know this road at all. She usually traveled by the north trail, but Father's letter had said to come the south way, without saying why.
"Bitterfeld?" she said. "Father owns this land!" She had heard the name on the tribute list. "They are late planting." She should stop and talk with the headman. It never hurt to let them know that Horth Wigson was watching.
"The rains are late," Verk said.
She did not know Verk well. As chief household guard, he spent most of his time close to Father, but he was a pleasant companion, well-spoken and good-looking. Father had hired the twins not long before she left for Kyrn, to spend the summer in the hills as all sensible rich folk did.
The chariot was a tight fit for two people and necessarily intimate. Verk's long braids hung below his bronze helmet, jiggling and dancing as the car bounced, and the wind rippled the golden fuzz on his arms. His armor was a knee-length leather smock coated with bronze scales, the hot sun making it reek of the dozens of house guards who had worn it before him. That was not his fault, but it was another reminder of proximity. His free hand was supposedly steadying his scabbard against his thigh, but every few bounces Frena would be thrown against that arm, like it or not, and her wrap was sleeveless also—skin against skin.
Fortunately Frena always kept her emotions under tight control. She had no romantic interest in a mere swordsman, a slab of a man who would risk his life for the chance to live and eat in a mansion. Verk was intelligent enough to share a little mild flirting without getting illusions.
He glanced down at her with a gleam in his unusually dark blue eyes. "If you do lose a wheel or snap the axle, mistress, please make sure you break my neck as well as your own."
"You are feeling suicidal? Angry husbands after you?"
"Husbands never frighten me, but an angry employer would."
"My father is a gentle, loving person, and extremely generous to his staff."
"Aee! That's true, mistress, but they do say he's mean when his servants skimp their duty."
"That's not true. Give me one example! Just one!"
"Quera."
"Who?" Frena said uncertainly.
"Quera. He had her impaled, they do say."
"No! You've been listening to slander. Who says that? That horrible Master Pukar, I'll bet!"
Verk shrugged his bronze-clad shoulders, not looking at her. Not smiling.
"You weren't there and I was!" Frena said icily. "I was only thirteen, but I saw! That awful woman was brought in to be Mother's night nurse when she was injured. When Mother died, Father could have beaten her and then dismissed her, or he could have had her charged with negligence. He didn't do either. He threw her out in the street with his own hands. I saw it! She deserved much worse than that, but even a court would not have impaled her. Impaling is only for really terrible crimes."
"Aee! Gold clinks louder than thunder, they do say."
"That is treason! And blasphemy! Judges in Skjar are all Speakers of Demern. Witnesses of Mayn give testimony. You accuse initiates of those holy cults of accepting my father's bribes? Of being intimidated by him?"
"Who won't march to the beat of the golden drum?"
This was subversive talk, going beyond informal chat. No servant should speak of his employer like that. "If my father wins a judgment it is because he is in the right."
"Ah, I meant no affront to the master, dear lady! Forgive a poor swordsman's folly. Any man who wears a sword in Werist country is born stupid."
"Tell her to slow down!" Uls yelled again. He was fa
lling farther behind, still enveloped in the red clouds raised by Frena's wild passage. Uls was stupid.
Verk was not.
Horth Wigson enjoyed owning things in sets—strings of pearls, fleets of ships, streets of houses, and now a pair of identical house guards. Not to be outdone, his daughter had treated herself to a matched pair of black onagers, very rare and very costly. After all, onagers were useful, while swordsmen were only decorative—life-sized animated bronze ornaments. Verk and Uls attended Horth when he expected important visitors. They escorted him on the rare occasions when he went calling on someone. The rest of the time they did little except harass maidservants.
Yesterday he had sent them to Kyrn to fetch Frena back to the city. The tablet they brought had been cracked, but quite legible. The seal impressed on it had certainly been his, and the Kyrn house scribe had read the message as being what the swordsmen said it was, that Frena was to go home to Skjar as soon as possible and they were to escort her. It had not said why Father needed her, which was annoying.
She hoped her visit would be short. The city was a steam bath in summer. Kyrn, on the far side of the hills, was blissful. All her friends were there now—boating, swimming, hunting birds in the marshes, driving chariots. In groups, of course. Women must watch their reputations, and very rich youngsters must be well guarded. All her friends were rich, although no old family fortune could compare with Father's. Not that life was all play at Kyrn. Far from it! She supervised the lambing and planting. Today she should be directing the planned extensions to the threshing floor and oast house.
"What did you mean, if not what you said?"
Verk pummeled himself, as if trying to scratch an itch under the bronze smock. "If Quera had been bribed to harm your mother, would you just throw her out in the street?"
The chariot was slowing down as the ground flattened and the onagers tired. Frena was able to spare her companion a hard stare.