The Three Lands Omnibus (2011 Edition)

by Dusk Peterson

  o—o—o

  The eighteenth day of May in the 943rd year a.g.l.

  When Morgan delivered my food this evening, I finally had the opportunity to ask him a question that has been bothering me. He laughed at length before saying, "Knox? May the gods bless his spirit – why would he tell us where to find you? Not that he had a chance to do any talking, once you'd delivered him back to the King's men." He raised his eyebrows, and I felt myself flush. Morgan took pity on me then, saying, "No, it wasn't Knox or any other breacher who told us where to find you. It was Piers."

  "Piers?" I said slowly. "He's one of you?"

  "He wasn't at the time you met him. You remember him, then?" Morgan placed his leg on the bench I was sitting on and slung his arm over his knee. He was taking care, I noticed, to stay out of arm's reach of me, but I was not such a fool as to think that I could fight my way past both him and the thieves in the room outside.

  I nodded slowly. "He gave me directions to the underground market here. And he talked about how he enjoyed playing pranks when he was young. . . ." My voice faded away.

  Morgan nodded. "When Griffith recruited him to our cause not long afterwards – they're distant kin to each other – he told us that, ever since that conversation, he had been thinking about how much more exciting his life was when he was young, and how he wished he could be as afire with ideals as he had been before the duties of manhood weighed him down. Well, Piers has the right blend of fire and restraint we look for in thieves. And he did us a favor by telling us about his conversation with you."

  "I didn't give him my lineage, though," I protested.

  "You hinted you were kin to the old nobility; he mentioned that to Griffith. And when Griffith asked for your description, your appearance matched. Piers told us you'd been with another man – 'with skin so white you'd think he was Emorian,' was the way he put it. So Griffith checked with our border guards— Oh, yes, we have men there too," he said, seeing my expression change. "This was only a fortnight after you had spoken with Piers, and the guards still remembered a certain dark-skinned mountain patrol guard who had breached the border as a prank with a light-skinned mountain patrol guard. . . ." Morgan's smile broadened. "The rest was easy. Or at least, it was easy for the Jackal, once he had the clue he needed as to where you had gone after you fled from Cold Run. Ever since he learned that you became a spy after you were released from the patrol, he has been waiting for you to return. He thought you would be back, in the end. He's very patient in such matters." He glanced down at my untouched plate. "Aren't you going to eat that?"

  I shook my head, and with a shrug he removed the plate. I sat for a long while, cold with sickness, thinking of the Jackal patiently waiting for his prey to return, so that he could pounce on me. . . .

  I don't feel I can write any more tonight.

  o—o—o

  The nineteenth day of May in the 943rd year a.g.l.

  Morgan came by again this morning and read what I had written so far in this portion of my journal. Keeping up the pretense that I am an honored guest rather than a prisoner, he asked my permission first. He laughed as he was reading but would not say why. I am trying not to be too bitter about this. I can remember many times when I and the other patrol guards laughed and joked while bringing a prisoner to the hut. I suppose that, in every blade-wielding profession, one becomes callous to other people's misfortunes.

  I haven't seen Griffith again since my capture. When I asked about this, Morgan told me that he had gone to fetch the Jackal from one of the villages. This implies that the Jackal's powers are limited, as I and another Emorian I know had guessed; otherwise, the Jackal would have known about my capture without being told.

  Since I have little else to do between the thieves' visits, I have found myself wondering what the Jackal is like in his human form. What is it like to live as a god-man, having the power to destroy or preserve all men around you? I cannot imagine that the god-man has any more understanding of human suffering than the god did before he came to the Land of the Living, since he himself can't have undergone any suffering. Perhaps he doesn't even fully understand that he puts his people through agonies when he demands their blood sacrifice – but there my sympathy extends too far, for he is a god, all-knowing, though not all-compassionate.

  All this has led me to wonder why the Jackal bothered to take on a human body. Why live among men when he himself cannot truly be a man? Is it his way of pretending that he is one of us? If so, he is like a king who puts on the clothes of a slave and parades through the city, then returns at day's end to his fine sheets and velvet cushions.

  So curious have I become about this question that I couldn't even wait for the Jackal's arrival, but instead asked Morgan. He said that I would understand when I met the Jackal – that some things cannot be explained but only experienced. This is the first thing any of the thieves have told me that I am sure is true. I can only hope that my curiosity will overcome my fear when the moment comes. I do not want to meet my death in a manner that would be shameful for one of the Chara's soldiers.

  o—o—o

  The twentieth day of May in the 943rd year a.g.l.

  He arrived this morning. He is not what I expected.

  The sound of Griffith's voice was what first alerted me to his coming. I pressed my ear against the door and did my best to make good use of my patrol-guard training. I could hear a tumble of voices and much laughter; from the snatches of phrases I could identify, it appeared that the thieves were giving their reports on what I had said during my imprisonment. Then the voices died down, and I could hear someone new speaking. He had a light, lilting voice, not what I would have imagined in a god, but whatever he said kept his thieves quiet. There was no more laughter, and from this I concluded that he must be telling them what he planned to do with me, and that the thieves were not as callous as I'd thought. Or perhaps the fate he planned for me was so dreadful that even they could not laugh.

  I have tried hard while writing these entries to avoid recording my various fears about what form my death would take, for I knew that the thieves would read this journal, and I didn't want to give the Jackal any ideas. But those fears were very much in my mind as I heard the voice stop and footsteps come toward my door.

  At moments like this, when waiting for a door to open and dark doom to enter, I found that one becomes occupied with trivialities. In this case, I could not figure out what to do with my hands and arms. Should I fold my arms over my chest as a sign of defiance? Should I place my hands behind my back, as though I were a prisoner brought before his judge? Should I lean casually against the wall, as though I was fearless?

  I was still worrying about all this when the door opened and the Jackal entered.

  His eyes were gold. That was the first thing I noticed. His eyes were bright gold and slanted; his whiskers were thin and sleek; his teeth were razor-sharp and curled into a grin. All this was just a mask, of course; I had known that it would be. But it is surprising how effective a painted god-mask can be when it is worn. I felt as though I were truly looking at the god's face.

  Something more entered the room with him, and this I cannot describe. I suppose that all this time, the skeptical, Emorian side of me was waiting to disprove that the man called the Jackal was a god. It was my only way to escape, after all; I could not escape death, but I would escape judgment if this was only an imposter. But what I felt when the man entered the room was what I had felt on the day of my coming of age. That could not be counterfeited; I had known the presence of the god's power then, and I knew it now.

  This alone kept me speechless to await the god's words. When they came, they matched the smile on his mask. "Well, Adrian," he said, "how do you like being the prey once more?"

  This mockery stung me. I heard myself reply, "I would rather be the Jackal."

  "Oh, I doubt that," he said. He was standing with his body swayed to one side, like a wild dog relaxed in its posture after a hard day's hunting. "You wouldn't wan
t to be the Jackal all of the time. Even as a patrol guard, you have not had to take on the duty of sitting in judgment over men."

  I swallowed, then launched into the first stage of my defense. "You have no right to judge me. I'm an Emorian now."

  "Then you ought to have stayed in Emor. I could have reached you in Emor, but I left you alone as long as you stayed there. Now you are in my land; now you are under my care once more. And so you must answer for the promise you made to me."

  The slanted eyes on his mask were punctured by eye-holes, but oddly enough, the human eyes behind the god's eyes appeared gold as well. I stared at them, trying to grasp at some thought that would not come. Then I realized that the Jackal was still waiting for my reply, so I said, "I made my vow to you when I thought that you and the other gods were good and just, but you're not – you're evil, and you have brought evil to this land. You command men to kill each other, just to satisfy your own blood-thirst, and when one man refuses to murder, you, the God of Mercy, condemn him for it. You said a moment ago that I am under your care; why should I believe that you care about me or any other human?"

  There was a pause, and then there was a soft, rippling sound, like that of a wind stroking the leaves of a tree. The god was laughing.

  Feeling my face grow warm, I shouted, "Stop that! It's not funny!"

  "Only because you do not see the joke," the Jackal replied. "When the gods look down upon human suffering and laugh, it is not because they are heartless to what men feel, but because they see widely enough to know the irony of all that happens. Laughter is only the other side of crying; I have done enough of both to know this."

  I willed away my own impulse to tears and countered, "I don't believe you. I don't believe that you've ever cried."

  "What were Fenton's first words to you when he returned from the priests' house?" the Jackal asked softly.

  I was silent, remembering the day during my twelfth year when Fenton had appeared at my home after his years spent living in the south. He had taken me up the mountain and told me the story of how the Jackal had fought to protect the Koretians against their enemies and had suffered grievous wounds, and then had wept for thirty days, not from his pain, but for the pain of his people. His tears, Fenton said, had turned into the black border mountains.

  "In any case, it is not for your broken blood vow that you must answer to me," said the Jackal. "It is for this."

  His left hand, which had been curved until this moment like a mighty claw, thrust forward suddenly with a rapidity that startled me as he tossed something at me that was round and black. I caught it automatically, then stared down at the twisted, blackened object in my hand.

  "It is not the same one, of course," said the Jackal. "The one you threw lies buried in the ashes of your birthday fire. But I thought it would remind you of what I gave you and of what you promised in exchange."

  I felt my stomach lurch in a sickly manner as I continued to stare at the blackroot nut before me. "I never told anyone about that, not even Fenton," I whispered.

  "You told me," the Jackal replied succinctly.

  My hand curled into a fist so that the jagged edges of the fire-burnt nut cut into my palm. "I asked you to give me the strength to do something that would please Fenton," I said firmly. "Killing his murderer wouldn't have pleased him; Fenton would have hated that. He would have wanted me to break my blood vow to murder."

  "I know," said the Jackal. "That is why I gave you the strength to do so."

  One of the slit windows above was casting down a shaft of light that illuminated the swirling golden dust before landing on the hair of the Jackal, which was black and tawny gold, like the fur of a beast. A second thought I could not place stirred within me, but I set it aside for the moment, saying, "You can't make me believe that you wanted me to break the vow."

  "Why should I lie to you?" The smile on the Jackal's mask remained. "You are under my power; I can do with you as I wish."

  "You can't make me worship you," I said. "That's what you're trying to do: you're trying to make me believe that the gods are good and that I should return my allegiance to you. It won't work. Whatever you do to me—" My breath failed me for a moment, and I had to swallow hard to chase away the tears before I said, "You can say what you like, but you can't change this fact: Fenton was sacrificed to satisfy your bloodlust. He was my friend, and I will never forgive you for that."

  There was a pause, and through the window slit I could hear the sound of men and women passing and talking. I thought to myself, This is the last sound I will ever hear. The Jackal bore no weapon on his belt, but somehow I knew that he did not need one.

  Finally, the Jackal asked softly, "What are the last words that Fenton spoke to you?"

  Not all that men will in the gods' names is the will of the gods. The memory of Fenton's blasphemy whispered in my memory. I could think of nothing to reply. The Jackal took several steps forward, and I tensed. Halting a short way from me, he said, still softly, "I did not will Fenton's death. I would have prevented it if possible. Both as a god and as a man, I loved him."

  I felt my breathing grow heavier, and I wished that he would kill me now, before the tears became too painful to contain. "How can I believe that?" I said with fury. "Fenton told Siward that it was your will that he die. Do you expect me to believe your word over his? I don't believe that you care about Fenton or anyone else."

  I waited to see whether he would laugh again, but he simply stood motionless for a moment. Then his hand reached up, and he pulled the mask from his face.

  "Then accept this as your proof," he said. "It is the only one I have to give."

  I stared dumbly at the brown face before me, set with a plain snub nose and a dented chin and the same golden eyes I had noticed before and which were now pressing frantically at my thoughts. Then his lips curled up like a leaf weighted with dawn dew, and I saw the human smile I had heard in his voice.

  "You don't remember me, I see," he said. "Well, it has been many years. I am your cousin Emlyn, and Fenton was my blood brother."

  o—o—o

  The twenty-first day of May in the 943rd year a.g.l. (continued from yesterday)

  I continued to stare at the face of the man before me: the snub nose he and I shared, the dented chin he had acquired from a misbegotten childhood prank played with his blood brother Griffith, and the golden-brown eyes I remembered now so clearly from our days spent together on the mountain.

  I found my tongue finally and said, "You were always the best Jackal."

  "And you were the best prey. I had Griffith trace where you had gone after you left the border mountain patrol, but it has taken me this long to trace your movements in Koretia as a spy. I think that my thieves were beginning to have some doubts about my abilities as a god-man."

  The lines about the edges of his eyes, which had not been there when I had last seen him, were crinkled with humor. Slowly, I was beginning to retrace my final conversation with Fenton and to recognize the hints he had given me. I took a deep breath and said, "I never knew. I never guessed when I was a child."

  "Nor did I. I thought for many years that my visions meant I had a demon within me and that I would be killed by stoning – another of those religious barbarities you assumed I approved of." He placed the back of his hand against his forehead and swept his hair back, a move so achingly familiar that I could almost forget the mask that was in that hand. "It was Fenton who helped me to discover what was within me and to join myself fully with the god. He stayed with me even after I foretold that he would be murdered because of me."

  I felt myself staring once more at the flames of Fenton's sacrificial fire, holding his letter to Emlyn in my hand, the one that spoke of Fenton's coming departure. "But he said that he was going to meet with you again," I said. "He must have known that he was going to die – he must have known from the moment our blood feud started with Cold Run. Why did he think that you two would be reunited?"

  Emlyn's smile had slowly sl
id away, but his voice continued to hold its innate lightness as he said, "He told you that himself, with his final words of life. 'The Jackal must eat his dead.'"

  I felt myself growing hot, as though the gold in Emlyn's eyes was the flame I had stood before in my memories. "No," I said. "No, how could you do that? How could you . . . take him like that if you loved him?"

  Emlyn sighed as he let the mask pivot beneath the gentle hold of his fingers. "It is hard to explain – hard to explain even to myself at times like this, when my godly powers are hidden deep below, and I am little more than a man. My powers are limited at most times, but even the god with whom I am united has limited himself in his dealings with men. The gods will not take away men's freedom of will; therefore they cannot take away men's freedom to will evil. The best I can do is to take what men will, make it my own will, and use the evil event to do good. Fenton offered up his sacrifice to me; therefore I was able to use his death to bring about good."