Mal glared his best, but Brisack was in far too good a mood.
“We have other matters needing attention,” Mal said abruptly. “We haven’t fully evaluated the information from the past raids, especially in Trades. Who died there, and what were the effects?”
“Just that easily, eh?” Brisack shook his head. “Just replace one citizen with another? One didn’t die here, but oh good—a few died there. Let’s get to analyzing!”
Mal rolled his eyes at the doctor’s attempt at sarcasm. “Citizens die every day. More are born to replace them. We can study one just as easily as another—”
“They’re not horses, Nicko. They’re humans! People are not interchangeable!”
“That’s where you’re wrong!” Mal’s patience finally wore out. “That’s the whole purpose of this study—the animalistic nature of humans! I’ll agree that there are subtle differences in personalities, responses, whatever. But when you get right down to it, you can use any mule to pull a cart, any woman to birth a baby, any man to wield a sword. Just teach, manipulate if you must, bridle, threaten, and control, and it will perform.”
“And one will not out perform another, through sheer will or determination or desire?” Brisack pressed.
“No!”
“And that’s why you’re invalidating the study on Perrin Shin,” Brisack suddenly snatched the upper hand, “because he proved everything you just claimed to be completely false? He’s defied your every attempt to control him, and he keeps succeeding!”
Mal opened his mouth, but no words came to it. A moment later he spoke. “New procedure. I want the forts to have a set of eyes in them.”
Brisack squinted. “In them? None of our officers in Command School—”
“Not officers,” Mal said. “What I have in mind are enlisted men. Shy boys requiring the frequent attention of their fort commanders to ‘bring them up’ a bit, take them under their wings, so to speak.”
Brisack let out a low whistle. “That’s never been done before.”
“Neither has been using the Administrators’ messaging service to send a warning from a Guarder,” Mal intoned.
“I’m not one of them,” Brisack declared. “Only an observer.”
“You swim in the same pond, Doctor.”
“There’s a great difference between the swans and the leeches, Nicko. And just what are you hoping to accomplish with this?”
“Keep an eye on the commanders. Nudge them back into place from time to time.”
Brisack shook his head. “You’re talking about putting in mere boys, Nicko. They aren’t nearly understated or experienced enough to pull off something so complex. They’ll be found out within days, especially if they’re trying to send messages.”
“I wouldn’t require constant messages,” Mal waved that off. “Only communication in times of extreme situations or unexpected opportunities. They could be successful once or twice a year.”
“Hmm,” Brisack considered, in spite of himself. Research was research, after all. Who was to say what was acceptable and what wasn’t?
Well they were, of course. They made the rules.
“You know,” the doctor mused slowly, “if just the right men are placed, they could deliver a wealth of information. How many forts will you begin with?”
Mal’s mouth formed a suggestion of a smile. “For now, just one. Training for this new position begins as soon as the right man is located.”
“But I haven’t sent any messages—”
“No,” Mal cut him off. “Only I do that now.”
Brisack bristled. “May I at least know which fort is receiving this new procedure?” he asked coldly. “Might it be Edge?”
Calmly Mal said, “Yes, to understand what makes him Perrin Shin. My good doctor, I will prove to you that he’s just another horse,” he continued with the determination of a man who would never be proven wrong again. “He may be more stubborn and willful than average horses, but I have yet to meet an animal I couldn’t break. It just takes the right amount of force. And the right man!”
---
“Are you comfortable?” Mahrree asked Perrin as she tried to find a way to cover his still-oozing wound with the blanket. Realizing the weight could irritate his stitches, she instead tossed a few more logs on the nearby fire.
“I’m comfortable—and warm—enough,” Perrin assured her. “You need to sleep too, my darling wife.”
Mahrree nodded grudgingly and crawled into bed between her husband and daughter, who whimpered briefly in her sleep. Mahrree smiled at her and thought, I’ve been wanting to whimper all day, Jaytsy.
“It’s sadly funny,” Perrin said as she tried to get comfortable, “you’d give anything to sleep on your stomach, and I’d do anything to sleep on my back.”
“We’ll never be satisfied, will we?” she sighed dramatically. “By the way, I saw the plans you drew for the new baby’s bedroom.”
“I think I should be able to start working on it in a few weeks when my stitches are fully healed.”
“You could get help,” she suggested. “Your plans are so detailed, anyone could follow them. Three layers of cross-hatched planking, with a space between two of the layers? Should regulate the heat much better.”
“I’ll add the extra layer to Jaytsy’s room first. It just gets too cold in there for a baby, especially on nights like this.”
“And if it works well, perhaps you could . . .” She paused. She knew he wasn’t going to like her idea, but she was feeling desperate that night.
Actually, that entire day.
Ever since she saw that horrible gash on his back—
“I could what?” he prompted.
“You’d be an excellent builder, Perrin. You’re strong, meticulous, creative—”
“What are you getting at, Mahrree?”
“Why don’t you be a builder instead of a . . .” She hesitated again.
“What, a destroyer?!” he snapped.
No, he wasn’t coming over easily to her idea at all. She sighed.
“I was deciding between saying ‘captain,’ ‘officer,’ or ‘commander.’”
“Which probably all mean destroyer to you!” he exclaimed quietly so as to not disturb his daughter. “We’ve been through this. No one else can keep Edge safe, and have you considered—”
“Have you considered,” Mahrree interrupted evenly, “that there are other commanders in the world? Idumea churns out a new crop of officers every year.”
“None that I trust to keep us safe!”
“If you weren’t the commander, you wouldn’t be a target, Perrin,” she pointed out. “I’m not stupid, you know. Your injury is a result of your job. And if you had a different job—”
“I’d still be a target, Mahrree. And so would you and our children.”
“How?” she demanded, beginning to lose patience with his stubbornness. “Why? We could drop out of sight, live a quiet little life, and no one would care about us. We’re nothing special, Perrin. It’s not like . . .”
She had to say it, just to see how he’d react. Her own little test of him.
“It’s not like . . . . the world’s out to get us,” she declared.
“And how can you be so sure?” he challenged.
Mahrree swallowed hard. “Because . . . because . . .” she faltered.
Someone just failed the test. She suspected it was her.
Then she felt her husband’s large hand tenderly caress her cheek.
Oh, and he was passing it so well, too.
“Don’t you ever get the feeling the world is out to get us, Mahrree?” he said gently. “And I thought you said you could handle be married to an officer. It’s what I was before I met you, what I planned to be ever since I was a child.”
“When I was a child, I planned to find Terryp’s land,” her voice quavered. “Sometimes we have to change our plans.”
He groaned quietly. “It’s just not that easy, Mahrree. This is what I have to do.”
She propped herself up to see him better. “Are you sure? Just explain to me why.”
“I can’t,” he whispered, his eyes pained. “I just know that we aren’t safe, nor might we ever be, no matter what I do.”
Mahrree rolled her eyes in frustration. “What a comforting thought to consider right before I go to sleep.”
He chuckled. “You’re so funny sometimes.”
“I wasn’t being funny.”
She hesitated again, and knew exactly why. She’d been feeling him near her all day, reassuring her that her husband would eventually recover, and trying to keep her calm so her belly wouldn’t tighten.
He also wasn’t pleased that she tried to push away his last mortal advice to her. He was waiting patiently—on the sofa it seemed—for her to come clean with the truth he told her long ago, and what he still told her frequently.
“Perrin, I suppose I should tell you. The night of our first debate, I heard my father whisper in my ear and . . .”
She sighed again, unsure of how he would respond to such an odd revelation.
“He said the world is out to get me. Actually, I thought he was alluding to you at first,” she gabbled on hurriedly, until Perrin’s loud exhale interrupted her.
“Will you believe him? And me?”
Mahrree didn’t expect that. She actually thought he’d squint at her warily and begin inquiring about the state of her mental health. That he so easily accepted that his father-in-law still communicated with her—
Well, maybe he was willing to take any ally he could get tonight, even one that resided in Paradise.
She got the impression that the someone on the sofa was grinning in appreciation before he faded away.
“I’d really rather not believe either of you,” she admitted. “I now realize why it’s easier to just imagine the sky is always blue, no matter what you actually see.”
“But Mahrree,” his tone became tender, almost pleading, “how will believing a lie save you from the truth?”
“It can’t,” she sighed in reluctant agreement. “And I don’t even need to look outside to see the color of the sky. It truly is black, and getting darker.”
“Yes, Mahrree. It is.”
“We could use a little blue,” she decided.
---
Lieutenant Heth had just returned to his quarters late that night, ending a disappointing evening because he was returning alone. What was the point of one’s roommates being out all night if one can’t take advantage of it? He was just unbuttoning his jacket when his door flew open.
“Where is he?!” Chairman Mal barked.
Heth stared at the unusual sight of the Chairman, his white hair disheveled and his red jacket untidy, yelling at him in the middle of the night. Heth glanced around. “Who, sir?”
Mal slammed the door. “You know who—Dormin!”
“I’ve told you sir, I don’t know. He said—”
“I’ve investigated every rubbish remover from here to the edges of the world!” Mal seethed. “No one matches his description, and now I need him more than ever.”
“Why? He’s useless.”
“Not as useless as YOU!” Mal spat, turned, and left the room, shutting the door with a resounding thud.
“And he’s the greatest leader the world has ever seen?” Heth scoffed. “The world doesn’t expect much of its leadership, does it. See?” he said with a smile of planning, “I could still be king.”
He withdrew his long knife from his waistband and gingerly caressed the thin, sharp blade.
“Because I’m fairly certain the same methods to eliminate a Shin will also work on a Mal.”
---
Early in the morning of the 64th Day of Raining Season, 320, Tuma Hifadhi leaned on his cane to watch the young men as they filed before him. Behind the elderly man stood several middle-aged men, their arms folded, watching critically. Last week’s failed raid in the forests above Edge brought everyone out in the snow sooner than they expected.
Things were different now, and the time had come.
Hifadhi evaluated the young men as they lined up in the field covered with new snow, the light of dawn just reaching them. Some of them were as large and strong as draft horses. Others were as quick and sneaky as coyotes. Still others were as quiet and subtle as deer. And each one of them was sharp, clever, and focused.
These ten had been selected out of several dozen, and now each waited patiently for the next stage. The weeding process had been most thorough. Even one of Hifadhi’s grandsons had been rejected, but it wasn’t because of his size or ability; it was because he was married and a father. Whomever Tuma chose would lead a life very different than he had known, and he couldn’t have any ties that might influence him to neglect his duty.
Hifadhi smiled at the confident faces that tried to conceal their apprehension. Some were more successful than others. He looked up and down the line, his gaze pausing just a moment on one young man a little taller and a little broader than the others.
Draft horse.
Hifadhi tried not to say anything with his eyes, but he suspected the young man could read them anyway.
He would be the one.
While he had the largest and strongest body of the men, his face was as smooth as a twelve-year-old boy. Even though he was as powerful as a team of oxen, he looked as sweet as a lamb. Everything about his body was contrary to who he was.
He was perfect, Tuma knew already. He was the sharpest and cleverest, with eyes that sparkled an innocent—and deceptive—sky blue.
In a few weeks, he’d be the newest man in the fort at Edge.
Acknowledgements . . .
First, thank you for reading this, and for being charitable with the niggling errors that I fear still remain, hiding like crabgrass despite my continuous weeding. (Mahrree and I both have gardening issues.)
My thanks next to my daughters: Tess (who’s read the entire series—several versions of it—and realized we needed someone named Sonoforen), Alex, and Madison Pearce, who each gave me responses that ranged from, “I loved this part!” to “I hated this part!” (Can’t beat children for honesty; it’s against the law.)
Thanks also to my friends and neighbors who willingly read drafts—sometimes more than once—and weren’t afraid to tell me what they really thought (and they’re still counted as friends, mostly): Marci Bingham, Stephanie Carver, David Jensen, Robbie Marquez, Cheryl Passey, Kim Pearce, Liz Reid, Liz Riding, Paula Snyder, Alison Wuthrich, and my sister Barbara Goff, whose constant nagging to “get this finished already!” has been motivating as only an older sister can motivate.
Also thanks to Dr. Daniel Ames, who taught me track changes and that revising the same passage fifty times is perfectly acceptable, and to our neighborhood cop, Cory Thomas, for reviewing some of the fighting sequences to make sure they sounded plausible.
I also appreciate the rest of my children for coping with my neglect (but I almost always remembered to make dinner). And thanks to my husband David who—after a cursory reading of the first book realized I wasn’t spending hours each day writing something vampy, and that Perrin Shin born a remarkable resemblance to him in both face and spirit—just shrugged when the house looked like nine tornados touched down, because he knew writing this made me oh so happy.
About the author . . .
Trish Strebel Mercer has been teaching writing, or editing graduate papers, or revising web content, or changing diapers since the early 1990’s. She earned a BA in English from Brigham Young University and an MA in Composition Theory and Rhetoric from Utah State University. She and her husband David have nine children and have raised them in Utah, Idaho, Maryland, Virginia, and South Carolina. Currently they live in the rural west and dream of the day they will be old enough to be campground managers in Yellowstone National Park.
(One of my friends suggested I use this photo,
because there’s “mystery on my face.”
But I think it’s pollen.)
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The Forest at the Edge of the World Page 45