by Lesley Smith
“Be seated, Marthus, with your son. Jeiana will join you in a minute.”
“As you wish, my Lady.”
Jaisenthia sat on the bank, beside the weeping woman. She lowered her hood, revealing her raven black hair, white skin, and eyes the colour sea foam. “Jeiana, it’s all right. It’s over, let go.”
“I can’t…” she moaned, shaking.
Jaisenthia knew Jeiana was not totally dead. She had moments left before her body succumbed to the water in her lungs, before her brain sparked out, and that was why she was still sitting on the bank. She was clinging onto what life she had left, but the grains of sand in her hand were slowly falling through her fingers.
“The pain is over. In moments your body will fail.” The psychopomp’s voice was soothing and Jeiana’s sobbing slowly stopped. “Someone I care for asked me to do something, to walk on your world. I wanted to ask a favour of you. Go with your family, go and be at peace, the trauma will melt away and you can be happy. I want to walk in your body, in your skin, but I need your permission to do so.”
“If I’m dead surely that’s a moot point?”
“It’s the way of things. There are rules to follow.” The Lady of the River said apologetically. “My companion will look after you, as will the part of me which remains on my boat. We will see you safe, I promise.”
Jeiana looked past her to her son and her beloved. They were waiting for her, and she knew she had no choice. It was too late to argue. “All right.”
Jaisenthia bowed her head. “Thank you.”
The Lady of the River saw the woman onto the boat, and watched the souls vanish on the horizon until their image of their passing faded. The Ferryman's eyes remained on her though, as Jaisenthia stepped into the water. Her clothes were soaked through, the weight dragging her down as she waded deeper and deeper.
She treaded the water of the River for a moment, looking up at the stars and preparing herself for the pain. There is always a distinct difference between knowing and feeling. The darkest agony would be like bliss compared to this. Then her head dipped below the water and then took a deep breath.
As dawn rose the next morning, Jeiana walked the marketplace, browsing through stalls in the cool morning air. She loved to touch random things; feeling the alien but familiar textures under her fingertips. There were scrolls and books, codices bound in baelish skin which smelled of incense, and the sacred reeds used to make the paper.
The gruff-looking Geholan man who ran the stall chuckled and indicated the book her hand was resting on. “That’s premium baelish leather, my girl. I stock only the best for my customers.”
Jeiana’s eye fell on a book of blank pages with a wrap-around cover which was held in place by a knotted plait of leather. The pages were spotless, and she found her eye falling on the artists’ materials, the charcoal, the inks, and the pigments. Her hand itched, as if this body remembered how to draw, and the need, the desire to do so, was suddenly excruciating.
“How much for this, a stick of the black charcoal, a bottle of the black ink and a stylus?”
“Well,” the man said. “That depends on the story you can tell me.”
Jeiana laughed in return, picking up the codex. “I know a good one actually. It’s an old story, about a raven-haired princess who invited death into the world to save her most beloved. Would you like to hear that one?”
The trader looked perplexed but he was already wrapping up the other items for her. “Yes, I suppose I would. Have a seat if you’d like.”
Jeiana took the offered seat, and began to spin her tale in a manner that would have made Ishvei proud.
By the time she finished, the Edoi in Taras’ caravan were nearly done assembling, their provisions traded, letters passed out and collected. The sense of joy in the air felt strange because of what she knew was coming. For a moment, as she walked through Gehol’s marketplace, she saw the devastation, the burning buildings, the wreckage from earthquakes and the smell of cooking bodies, mortals roasted in their skins by the heat of a raging star.
The day was warm, but a chill crept down her spine. She found a free table at a small shop selling tea and ordered a cup. There was a raised, ornamental pool in the middle of the marketplace with fish drifting under the water, and Jeiana found the scene calming. For a moment she could forget the horror that was to come.
Sipping her tea, she watched the traders packing their stalls and waited patiently. A tiny part of her was worried that Chelle would think her mad and not show up. The part of her that was still that woman’s sister knew better. As predicted, the woman who was not her sister arrived just as Jeiana was climbing into one of the caravans, a heartbeat from giving up hope.
“Wait! Ana!”
She was glad she had listened to memories which weren’t hers. “Taras, could you wait a moment?”
“For you, Ana, of course!” The clanfather called back.
Kei’a squeaked in joy at the sight of her aunt. The little girl was too young to see beyond the physical, so Jeiana scooped the girl up into the caravan and then reached out a hand to Chelle, to help pull her up. Knowing who she was, Jeiana fully expected Chelle to hesitate before accepting her hand, but her sister moved without missing a beat.
Chelle was dressed in travelling clothes which failed to hide her expanding belly, sensible footwear for walking, and she carried a knapsack on her back. She had brought water, a little food and her jeweller’s tools. Jeiana knew that to many, this might seem foolish, but her tools were handy for more than just making objects of beauty. They had more practical uses which would serve all of them well in the coming days.
The idea of it made her heady. This was it, the moment of forming for the first kishai, the first community. The Edoi had a similar concept, bound by clan and caste for centuries, but this was the beginning of something new. A kind of family never seen before in Kashinai history, where each was as important as the other, regardless of whether they were a pauper or a priestess.
“Father, we’re on board!” Jeiana called to Taras.
“Right you are! Walk on, Feium Asun, walk on! We ride for Aiaea and the New Year!”
As the caravan trundled out of the city, Jeiana felt a pang of guilt. The traders, the priests, the townsfolk; all would die. Some quickly, others slowly, but it wouldn’t be painless and it was totally avoidable. Her hand felt for her new knapsack. She had told the same tale first to the bag-seller and then the old bookman. Yet she had made no attempt to warn them, to save their lives. They would die, but they would return. It was inevitable, she just wished it would be unexpected and painless rather than agony-induced terror. But she knew that it was impossible to save everyone. Many others still lived in denial of such a simple fact.
Chelle hummed a lullaby to the girl-child in her belly while Kei’a snored softly. Jeiana pulled out her journal and the stylus slipped into her hand. She filled the reservoir with ink and began to scribble. At first it was just words and fragments of memory, but she soon found herself drawing a sigil or crest; a white flower and a red flower, their stems intertwined like the tails of two Kashinai in love, and she knew they represented life and death. She couldn’t remember what the image was called, but it was emblazoned onto her subconscious like an imprint of dancing sunlight on closed eyelids, and it wouldn’t go away.
Herblore was not her gift. These flowers were probably a vestigial image from the transition, information that had degraded. She couldn’t remember their purpose, but she was positive someone would be able to identify them. Jeiana found herself sketching what the other part of her mind recognised as a scientific doodle, a diagram of the star system before and after the Changing of the Sun—what the Kashinai would call Thaeosadvaha—“Thaeos’ Rage”—in years yet to come. The second moon and the twin rings of floating rock which would eventually criss-cross the planet in a lazy dance were things no mortal could know unless they were an oracle. Jeiana was definitely not an oracle, but she would eventually meet the one who was.
She understood that the memories would fade. That had become plain when she realised she couldn’t remember the name of the soul she had called ‘beloved’. Now, days later, the image of his face had begun to dim, and so she sketched what she could before the memory crumbled completely. No mortal could retain all the information in that fleshy organ that she had access to, so this was not completely unexpected. Losing this information, though, would mean the end for Ishvei’s people and that would be a terrible thing. Not just for this world, but for the future.
This was why hosts were so seldom taken. It was not beyond her ability to create a form as solid as this one, as real as those possessed by any soul on this planet as Ishvei and Arvan had done in the distant past. The problem with that was that any Oracle, attuned as they were to higher things would know Jeiana the moment she walked into a room. Her fabricated form would shine with the light of eternity and that was why she had to borrow the form of a dying mortal.
Clothed in flesh, the Oracle Saiara would never know what she was; but the price was steep. Her memories would fade and eventually so would she, supplanted by the shadow of the woman whose soul no longer inhabited this body. The idea of forgetting herself made Jeiana shudder, but there was time before that happened and at least she could write it all down. Normally, if they were going to walk the world, it was done in pairs, one soul to remind the other of what they were. She was not that lucky, but at least she had a way to make sure she could jog her failing Kashinai mind and pass it down through Chelle and her daughters.
Her kind seldom meddled like this; in person, as it were. They were guardians, protectors of the order. While that involved an affinity with time, there were some things they could not change. This, though, this would affect a thousand worlds over a hundred thousand seasons. That was worth risking the pain and the frailty because of the shining firebird that would rise from the ashes.
She thought of a little restaurant by the water on a twilight world. Two Kashinai lived there and had invited a lost young boy into their home. The values, born here and now, would instill in that son of an alien world a sense of purpose which would see him becoming a powerful force for all that was good and right. He would become the champion of a collective of worlds that spanned half a galaxy, and it was a collective that would not exist without the sons and daughters of Ishvei’s World and their water-born Sisters.
The songs reverberated in her head. The lullabies of the Water Children and their First Parent, who the astute—the psychically sensitive—sons and daughters of Caerim had called the Lady of the Waves. No. She shook herself, no one knew about them yet. That would come later, with An’she and Sarai, many seasons in the future.
Jeiana would not live to meet them, not while their souls were wearing those identities. Though important, they were not sisters in this lifetime. They were souls whose fates were already mapped out. Predestined, because they formed the foundation for the history of more than just a single world.
Hope burning brightly, the caravan moved on, forward towards its destiny, and for a while, Jeiana watched the world pass by.
City of the Disembodied Goddess
To listen before speaking is to show inner strength and Aia's wisdom.
The writings of Kaiene the Blessed, first Oracle of Aia.
As Thaeos began to sink over the city of Aiaea, the populace descended onto the cobbled streets in force to celebrate. Casks of wine were broken open, meat roasted on spits and crackled over the fires. Warm bread was torn by friend and foe alike, and songs of celebration floated on the breeze like incense.
On the Sacred Way, the paved path which wound from the city gates through the marketplace to the temple steps, stalls were selling their wares in the traditional method. All refused to accept money this holy night, preferring tales told in honour of Ishvei.
People sat on the great pigment-stained stones or the freshly cut goldengrass—which despite its name was actually purple—sharing their feasts, and the castes were forgotten. Everyone, whether temple maidens, attendants, or townsfolk, stood together watching troupes of Edoi dancers and entertainers juggling fire as they moved through the streets in procession singing the sacred songs together.
Above them, hung from the blooming kara trees, were banners covered in calligraphy. As people walked, they told the story of how Kaiene befriended Ishvei, their creator’s mortal avatar, and how her beloved Arvan blessed the blind mortal girl with sight beyond sight, naming her the patron of Oracles. This was Kaiene’s day as much as Ishvei’s, and they honoured her, too; the blind seer who had brought them prosperity and protection from the ravages of the unknown.
The entertainers moved down the winding steps like flame-winged firebirds. There were women in long silks who danced, their lithe bodies moving like water through a gully with bells attached to their ears, wrists, and tails. The songs followed them, as did laughter and the sound of children yelling in delight.
Some of the entertainers juggled fire, others orbs of glass or crystal, and a few somersaulted in long arcs, their tails plaited with bells dancing behind them. The youngling children gasped with joy, laughing and pointing as they lined the steps. Their parents tried to get them to keep moving so they could make it in time for the blessing ceremony at the Temple, but it was a lengthy battle that would take time to win. The crowds moved slowly; it would be a while before they reached the terrace.
High above, arching over the crowds, the messenger-carrying dennabirds sang of release and a night’s freedom to float among the stars. The High Chamberlain had let the creatures lose. They were princes of the skies flying low over the crowds and swooping from the high tower where the Oracles dwelled.
In the skies, the echoes of the New Year lights were already rippling across the horizon, revealed by Thaeos’ receding glare. Blue and purple, yellow and red, they moved, rippling like a visible wind. Later there would be fireworks; once Thaeos set and the sky truly darkened. To the east, white Kaiene was already rising, full and pregnant with mystery.
On the Temple terrace, patiently awaiting admittance, children were singing memory chants and pointing out the constellations slowly rising in the heavens: the Birds, the Sisters, the Magi, the Water Maidens, the Fire Lizard, the Ring, all scattered across the great River of Stars. All the children were dressed in their finest clothes, as befitting those who would receive the blessing of the Lady of Words and given their first inkbrush. After the festival, classes would begin and they would have to learn the hieratics and the movements required to make them.
It seemed the whole of the continent of Reshka had crammed themselves into the winding streets of Aiaea’s temple district. The people had come from as far as Ossoi and Baaren, near the Great Forest of the Lightflies and the sacred Canhei Basin, for the celebrations and the three day festival that commemorated the Ishvei’s arrival on their small world.
Jashri, the High Oracle, hated the procession. In the beginning, she had tolerated it because she must. As she aged, as her paranoia had begun to eat her whole, she began to walk alone less and less, fearful of the streets outside the temple walls. Blind, even though she was able to walk without a staff or guidance, she feared the words spoken by those who didn’t know her identity as she moved, shrouded in an Edoi hakashari.
Now mother-aged but childless, she was too used to the safe sanctuary of the Oracles’ Tower, high above the city streets. Since her Ascension to the exalted position of High Oracle many years before, she had learned to walk the halls in eternal darkness with just a mental map to guide her.
Jashri knew every corridor and staircase, every statue and stained glass window. Outside she was exposed and overwhelmed by the sounds and smells, by so many things she couldn’t control. All she wanted was the quiet privacy of her chamber and her beloved forest cat.
“Breathe,” she said to herself. “Just breathe.”
Behind her, Eirian, her predecessor, moved closer and placed a gentle hand on the High Oracle’s shoulder. “Your Grace? A
re you all right?”
Being with the blind, the lie was harder. You could lie with a smile, if the one you lied to could see. Living among her blind sisters, lying was a more skilled art. As they could not be deceived by their vision, they were very able at telling truth from falsehood. Lying became all about the right tone and inflection, and that took much more concentration.
“I’m fine,” she said softly, careful to keep her tone flat and avoid the higher octaves which would betray her hidden distress.
Dressed in their ritual vestments of blue robes and the red cloth over their eyes, it was hard to make out which of the Oracles was which, though there were just five of them now: Eirian, Jashri, Geetha, Keiue and Shaari, the youngest. Iasei, old and dying, was too sick to leave her pallet and so was exempted from the procession.
Jashri walked at the head as tradition dictated, her own staff stamping out the rhythm by which the others followed. The repetition calmed her. She knew where she was heading; the way was clear and, even blind, she knew each step, each impression under the soles of her baelish-skin sandals.
The High Oracle moved with such confidence that there had been some years when many had wondered if she was, in fact, blind. It had been many years since she had last had sight. Her eyes had been put out, and she gladly covered the empty sockets with the prescribed length of scarlet-red cloth. She was aware that most of her sisters had some sight, some could even see light and shadow, but Jashri had none.
She shied away from the memory of what had happened, from the other girl who had died that day. She was not that girl anymore, and no one but Eirian and old Iasei, the kindly crone and oldest in the sisterhood of seers, remembered her origins.