by Steven Brust
“But you cannot fail to notice that you have lived for more than a hundred years, whereas those around you rarely achieve half that age.”
“But, my dear Arra, you have lived as long as I.”
“But you know that this is a gift from the goddess, for I have explained it to you.”
“Well, and could she not grant me a similar gift?”
Arra could only respond to this with an eloquent shrug, as if to say, “I am at a loss for how to go on.”
At this point, Miska could no longer contain himself, and began to laugh—and his laugh, the reader should understand, consisted of no small chuckles, but rather big, booming guffaws, and were accompanied by a rocking of his whole body, and tears streaming down his face. Morrolan frowned. “Do you know, I am becoming annoyed,” he remarked.
Miska, for his part, did not notice, being too occupied with laughing, but Teldra said, “Please, my lord; forgive him. He means no offense, and does not laugh at you, but, rather, at the absurdity of the situation, which, I assure you, is as unlikely as any I have ever encountered, or am likely to.”
“Well,” said Morrolan, a bit mollified, “if you would be good enough to explain it, perhaps I will see the absurdity as well.”
“That is not unlikely,” said Teldra.
“Well then?”
“Permit me to try,” said Arra.
“Do so, by all means,” said Morrolan and Teldra. (Miska said nothing, as he was still endeavoring to stifle his laughter.)
“You have,” said Arra, “heard of elfs?”
“Elfs? But of a certainty. They live in the West, over the mountains.”
“That is true,” said Arra, “although some of them, from time to time, come east to our side of the mountains.”
“Well, and if they do?”
“Well, then, sometimes they settle down and live here.”
“Why should they not? There is good country on this side of the mountains.”
“Well, of what does living consist?”
“Living? Well, it consists of walking, of sleeping, of eating—”
“And having children?”
“Well, yes.”
“And dying?”
“Well, yes, dying can be seen as part of living, if you wish.”
“I more than wish, I insist upon it.”
“Very well, if you insist, I accept it.”
“Good then. Let us see what we have.”
“Yes, let us do so.”
“We have elfs who have crossed the mountains, and had children, and died.”
“Yes, as well as walking and eating and sleeping.”
“Oh, I do not say they didn’t do those things as well.”
“That is good, for if you did, I should have to dispute with you.”
“But for now, let us consider only having children and dyting.”
“Very well. It is sad when those things happen together—that is, when two people die soon after having a child, for that leaves the child an orphan.”
“Exactly.”
“I know of this, because it is what happened to me.”
“Exactly,” said Arra. “Now do you comprehend?”
Morrolan frowned. “But we were speaking of elfs.”
“Well, and what do we know of elfs?”
“They live on the western side of the mountains.”
“And what else?”
“They have magical powers.”
“What sort of magical powers?”
“Oh, as to that, I have no idea, I assure you.”
“Well, they live a very long time, do they not?”
“Yes, so I have heard.”
“And they are very tall, and thin, and, in addition, they have no beard.”
“Yes, I believe I have heard that too.”
“Have you ever shaved, my dear lord?”
“I? Well, I have never had the need.”
“And then?”
Morrolan stared at her, comprehension at last coming to him. Miska was at last able to stop laughing, and just watched Morrolan with an amused twinkle in his eye.
At last Morrolan said, “Do you pretend that I—”
“Exactly,” said Arra.
“Impossible!”
“Not at all.”
“But why would no one have mentioned it to me?”
“I, for one, assumed you knew.”
“As did I,” added Miska.
“But those who raised me—”
“Almost certainly wished to conceal your nature to protect you.”
“I cannot believe it,” said Morrolan.
“You cannot doubt it,” said Arra.
“And yet—”
“Well?”
Morrolan fell silent, considering what he had been told. At last he said, “I am an elf?”
“As much as I am, myself, my lord,” said Teldra. “Although I am an Issola, and you are, to judge from your countenance, a Dragonlord.”
“You perceive, I do not comprehend what these terms mean.”
“Then, if you wish, I will explain.”
“I think I am not yet ready for more explanations.”
“I understand,” said Teldra, “and will wait until you are ready.”
“That will be best.”
Miska wiped tears of laughter from his face and said, “Well, it was worth a drive of three hundred kilometers just to be here for this moment.”
Morrolan, in the meantime, stared at his hands as if he had never seen them before. “I am an elf?” he murmured.
“We call ourselves human,” said Teldra gently.
“Who does not?” said Arra.
“Or Dragaeran, if you prefer,” said the Issola.
“Dragaeran,” said Morrolan, as if trying out the word to see how well it fit into his mouth.
“I wonder …” said Teldra.
“As do I,” said Morrolan. “I wonder many things.”
“I do not doubt it in the least,” said Teldra. “But there is a thing I wonder in particular.”
“Well, and what is that?”
“I wonder about your family name, and who your ancestors were, and so on.”
“Oh,” said Morrolan. “I know that.”
“How, you know?”
“Of a certainty. While I know little of those who bore me, I at least know my family name. Is it important?”
“Important?” said Teldra. “I nearly think it is!”
“Well, and why is it important?”
“Because from it, we can, with some work, learn many things that would be of interest to you.”
“What sorts of things?”
“Your lineage, any ancestral holdings you might have, your family history.”
“How, you pretend we can learn these things merely from my name?”
“It is likely, although it may take some few years, and much traveling.”
“Well,” said Arra suddenly, “it seems to me that we were just discussing the idea of travel, were we not?”
“That is true!” said Morrolan.
“Travel?” said Miska. “And to where were you considering travel?”
“We had not yet made that decision,” said Morrolan. “We were waiting to see if the goddess wished to give us a sign.”
“And,” said Arra, “I nearly think she has. Indeed, were the sign any more prominent, it would block our view of the sky.”
“Lady Arra,” said Morrolan, “I agree with you entirely.”
“Well,” said Teldra. “Let us see. First of all, if you will tell me your family name, then perhaps even from that I can make a guess as to a destination for which to start.”
“You wish me to tell you now?”
“If you would be so good.”
“Very well. My father’s name was Rollondar, and—”
“Rollondar?”
“Yes, that was it, and my—”
“Rollondar e’Drien?”
Morrolan looked at Lady Teldra, who had, qui
te against custom of the Issola, interrupted him, and had even done so twice, and who was now staring at him with an expression of astonishment on her countenance.
“Yes, my family name, I learned, was e’Drien. But tell me, for I am curious, why this seems so remarkable to you, for I perceive that you are startled.”
“I am, indeed, and I will tell you at once why it is so.”
“I am listening, then.”
“Here it is: I know exactly who your father was, and, moreover—”
“Yes? Moreover?”
“I know where to find your ancestral lands.”
“Ah! I have ancestral lands.”
“Indeed you do.”
“Are they far from here?”
“Rather, yes. Across the mountains, down a long river, and within a hundred leagues of the great city of Adrilankha, which lies along the Southern Coast of what was once the Empire.”
“That does sound like a long way,” said Morrolan.
“It is no quick journey.”
Morrolan turned his face to the west, and used his hand to shield his eyes from the Furnace which, in the East, was blazing brightly enough to be annoying to anyone who looked at it.
“Yes,” said Teldra, as if reading his thoughts. “It is to the West that our destiny lies.”
Morrolan nodded, and continued staring. After a moment he turned to Lady Teldra and said, “What else do you know of my family?”
“I know one thing that will amuse you, I think.”
“Well, I do not mind being amused.”
“If you do not, then I will tell you.”
“Do so.”
“It is this: Your name, Morrolan, means Dark Star in the language of the Silites, who lived in this region many, many years ago, and whose language is still spoken by some.”
“Well, and if it does?”
“Your father also took his name from the same tongue, and it means, ‘Star that never fails.’”
“Ah. That is remarkable. A coincidence, do you think?”
“It is,” said Arra, “unlikely to be a coincidence when the goddess is at work.”
“Well, that name was given me by the good Miska here.” They looked at Miska, who merely shrugged.
“‘Star that never fails,’” repeated Morrolan. “Well, did he fail?”
Teldra said, “I would think, looking at you, my lord, that he did not.”
Morrolan nodded.
“And then?” said Arra.
Morrolan shrugged. “Do you, Arra, speak to our Circle. Tell them whither we are bound, and have them meet us there as best they can in their own time, and, moreover, have them spread the word to every witch that we will gather there.”
“I will do so.”
“Someday we will return, though; there is a debt here that I have not paid.” With this he sent a dark glance to the northeast.
“Then we are leaving?” said Arra.
“Yes. And if you wish to accompany us, Lady Teldra, we should like nothing better.”
Teldra bowed and said, “I should be honored, my lord.”
“And you, good Miska?”
“Me? No, my dear Dark Star. I believe I must return to my own land, now that I have delivered the Lady to you.”
“As you wish. But you must not fail to call on me, should you require me.”
Miska shrugged, as if to say that, save for his preferred drink, there was little he was likely to need.
Morrolan nodded and looked to the west once more. “We leave at daybreak,” he said.
Chapter the Eighth
How the Society of the Porker Poker
Came to Exist, and How It Had
Its Final Meeting
It was on a Farmday in the middle of winter in the 246th year of the Interregnum that the Society of the Porker Poker met for the last time. The Society had already had its number diminished in several ways: first when the Tsalmoth, Stagwood, had taken to the road to pursue his desire to be a bard; next when Flute, of the House of the Hawk, had become disgusted with the bickering of certain of the other members and ended her association with the Society; and most recently by the exodus of Mialand, of the House of the Lyorn, who had married and gone to live with her husband in the iron center of Lottstown, far to the East. With all of these desertions, more or less justified, the Society now numbered only four. All the members of the Society were between one hundred and three hundred years old—in other words, at the age where adulthood looms over one and demands an end to childish things, but the enthusiasm of youth has not yet been lost. Were the Empire still in place, no doubt they would have long before scattered and been pursing whatever lives their inclinations had led them toward, or at least living each in his own household; but the Interregnum had the effect, in addition to all of its other effects, of keeping families more firmly bound together, as if to provide a better defense against the untamed world outside the doors of the family manor.
The names of these four will, no doubt, mean little to the reader, yet our duty as historian requires that we introduce them at this time, in hopes that, hereafter, they will mean more, and will stir in the reader’s heart and mind whatever feelings of affection or disdain the unfolding of this history will engender. They are, then: Lewchin, Shant, Piro, and Zivra.
Lewchin, the only daughter of a Marchioness of the House of the Issola, was a hundred and ninety or two hundred years old, tall, dark, and rather frail in appearance; she was distinguished by that grace of speech and manner which always marks those of her House. She lived with Shant, who was nearly the same age as she.
Shant was the oldest son of a Dzurlord; and although he and Lewchin could not marry, owing to the difference in their Houses, they nevertheless lived together as husband and wife, as many did during that period of spiritual as well as material decay called the Interregnum. Shant was short and stocky for a Dzurlord and distinguished by green eyes and wavy fair hair that he wore in perpetual disarray, covering his noble’s point.
The third member was Zivra, who was something of an enigma. She appeared, at first glance, to be the Dragonlord she dressed as, and as, indeed, were her guardians. Yet she had blond hair, rare among that House, and fair skin; and above all she displayed a coolness and evenness of temper and a calm attitude that made one think more of a Lyorn noble. From the shape of her ears and her noble’s point one could easily believe her ancestors were Dragons, yet again, she lacked the sharpness of feature that one would have expected; instead her face was rather heart-shaped, her lips thin, her nose small, and her eyes widely spaced and vibrant. A casual observer might suspect her of being of mixed Houses, yet there was some indefinable quality about her that denied this. She was soft-spoken, yet there was no hesitation in her judgments of people or events, and she seemed, moreover, to be looking always ahead, as if there were something in the distance, or the future, that was calling to her. She was the oldest member, being two hundred and forty or two hundred and fifty years old, and if she still lived with her guardians, rather than having struck out on her own, it was because her guardians, having no offspring of their own, had made her their heir, and, being old themselves, desired her assistance in managing the family estate.
The remaining member of the Society was Piro, who was the Viscount of Adrilankha and, moreover, he for whom this history is named. His mother was Daro, the Countess of Whitecrest, and his father was Khaavren, who had been the Captain of the Phoenix Guard at the time when the last Emperor was assassinated and the city of Dragaera dissolved into a sea of amorphia; and who is someone of whom we entertain hopes the reader will not have forgotten from those earlier histories in which he played no small rôle. Piro was, therefore, of the House of the Tiassa, as could be seen by the white and blue he affected; his quick smile; his bright, intelligent eyes; his lean form; and his long, nervous hands. He was, at this time, just about one hundred years old, and was the youngest member of the Society.
These characters being sketched, we will now, with the reader’s
permission, give a brief history of the Society itself before moving on to the events of its last meeting. It had been formed, then, some forty or forty-five years previously, when some of its founders were barely more than children. The present members, along with a few others, had long been friends; indeed, had already formed bonds of common sympathy natural to a group of children of the same social class living near each other. They would often form parties of pleasure in which they would walk or ride into pasture or jungle areas near the outskirts of Adrilankha, where they would hunt or fish or simply sit and talk in the manner of children, and, later, in the manner of young adults.
On one such occasion, walking through the Generous Wood near the ruins of Barlen’s Pavilion on the west side of the city, they happened to disturb a wild boar, who panicked and charged them, snorting and bristling. Shant happened to be carrying a sword he had recently acquired—a poorly wrought sword, to be sure, but one that had a point nevertheless, and before he knew it, he had drawn it and held it out between his friends and the boar. The boar, with surprising intelligence, had stopped short of this formidable obstacle, and stood its ground, snarling and snorting, at which time Shant gave a halfhearted lunge, which punctured the skin of the boar, and which puncture, in turn, sent the beast scampering back into the woods.
The friends, the danger now averted, relieved their tension through the sort of laughter that often follows fright—especially fright that, in the event, proves unfounded. Shant was declared a hero, to which he responded, between giggles, by holding his sword aloft and saying, “I dub thee Porker Poker.” The friends then immediately swore eternal allegiance to the Society of the Porker Poker, a name which stood them in good stead in the years that followed. We do not, by the way, know which members of the Society were actually present at the time, because the story was so often spoken of among them that those who were not there could soon tell it as well as those who were, and even see it in their minds, and so everyone eventually forgot who had truly been present—the incident had become the common property of the Society.
One by the one, members drifted away because of other interests, marriage, or relocation. Shant acquired a better sword, but kept Porker Poker suspended by wires on the wall of the parlor of his home in Adrilankha, which home he later shared with Lewchin. It was here, then, that the Society met in the small but tidy parlor of Shant’s family home in Adrilankha, with Porker Poker—to which, by custom, they solemnly offered the first toast—still on the wall above them.