by Lesley Smith
“She survived Caerim?”
Chelle hesitated. “Sort of. Jeiana died and Ana took her place.”
“Where is she now?”
“I’m not sure. In all honesty, she comes and goes, I can’t keep track of her. She mentioned going to the Hall of Healing to have her wounds looked at.”
Across from them the Kodian priestess, Danae, looked alert. “Ah, she’s gone to see my Senna then. Good.”
“Senna?”
“Senara of the Evastas, one of my lodgers and a former priestess of the senses,” Danae explained. “She now works as a healer in the temple grounds, her true calling, I think. Senna will look after her, regardless of whose soul walks in your sister’s body.”
“That’s good to know,” Chelle said. “I worry for her.”
Now, days later, Meresia was eating lunch when Jio, one of the youngest of the Edoi boys, danced through the door, calling out. Danae had been telling her how Senna had lost her heart to the indwelt Jeiana, and how the pair had been seen leaving that morning, hand in hand, with an expression on their faces that all recognised as love. Taras had joined them only a few minutes before with a proclamation in his hands that had seen him scarlet with fury.
“Mother Mere?”
Meresia had been sitting with Thressia, Danae, and Chelle, trying to calm Taras down. She looked up as an older boy—Jio’s big brother, Kadian—and a figure in a hakashari stepped over the threshold. Meresia’s heart sang. She knew who the figure was before she lowered the hood. Aia whispered, speaking of danger and trouble, but the Clanmother’s delight could not be dampened.
“Adria? My dear child!” Meresia ran over to the figure, tipped back the hood, and then hugged the girl beneath the voluminous garment. “I have missed you, daughter.”
“Sister?” Thressia exclaimed. “I thought we weren’t going to see you!”
Surrounded by family Vashi was suddenly glad she had come. Thressia had grown even more, her hair now long enough to cover her trineal node, and her tail betrayed that, yes, she was going to be a very tall adult.
“I’m sorry, mother, but Jashri forbade me my time with you.” It sounded like such a pathetic excuse. “I can’t stay more than a few moments, but Jio said you planned on quitting the city?”
“It’s all right, Vashi. Your oath is important to you, you did the right thing.” Meresia poured her a glass of ataani juice from the pitcher in the centre of the table. “You know Taras of the Feium Asun?”
Vashi smiled. Taras was responsible for half of what made Kadian, and she saw the older man’s eyes in Kadi’s each morning they awoke together, even if Jio was the clanfather’s only official son. “Clanfather,” she greeted him.
“And this young woman is Chelle of Gehol.”
Vashi was surprised. “You’ve come a long way for New Year!”
“I’m just passing through. My sister and I are going north with the Feium Asun.”
“I feel like I’ve missed something.” Vashi sat. “What is going on, mother?”
“Father Taras was just ranting,” her younger sister said.
Vashi’s eyes fell on the paper in the middle of the table. It was Darus’ latest missive banning the Edoi meeting in groups of more than ten in public places, lest they cause trouble. The calligraphy was hard to read and couched in temple language. She found herself reading aloud. “‘Until inspired by Aia to name her successor, the recent calling of a new oracle remains a private matter. Her status remains to be confirmed until the Parliament of Oracles meets again’.”
“‘A private matter’?” Taras spat. “Nothing like this is ever hidden. Something’s going on in there, I say.”
Meresia was the leader of the largest clan of wanderers and she shushed him. “Taras, quiet down before the guardians hear you. Do you want to be arrested?”
The gruff old man snorted. “I’d like to see them try!”
“As Clanmother I say be silent!” Meresia was a good couple of decades younger than Taras, but she had the power needed in her words to remind him of her authority. “Daughter, we plan to leave in a few days, I need you to prepare.”
“But Jashri won’t release me.”
“I plan to speak with her,” Meresia said gently. “She has broken the terms of your bond, and according to temple statute I can ask for your release. Particularly in light of the murmurings about Saiara.”
“The Parliament meets tonight,” Vashi said carefully. She couldn’t go into any more detail than that, and even that much made her nervous. “Saiara’s fate will be decided. Eirian believes she is Jashri’s successor, as do the other living oracles.”
Taras frowned. “She was so different when I first met her, so terrified. What happened?”
“I don’t know,” Vashi said. “Mother, please, don’t do anything which will anger her. If she finds I’ve met with you against her express command, I dread to think of what she will do.”
Meresia cupped her eldest child’s cheek. “I will speak with care. Don’t fret, daughter, all will be well.”
“I need to go,” Vashi said. “How many days?”
“Two, maybe three,” Chelle spoke. “Jeiana has been becoming more anxious with each passing day, as if a sandclock is running out. She can’t be specific, other than that we must be in Canhei by High Summer’s Day.”
“We don’t have long then,” Meresia said. “And the River Road will have flooded by now.”
Taras’ eyes narrowed and something unspoken passed between him and the Clanmother. “You would take the Oasis Road?”
“My aunt made that proclamation. She crossed the River long ago and if we have no alternative, I will take it.”
He glanced sideways at her, but said nothing and Vashi wanted to ask why. The Edoi avoided the Oasis Road and she had assumed it was merely due to the hostility of the desert during summer. The way her mother spoke, though, she sensed there was something more to this than either of them was saying.
The afternoon bell rang in the distance. “I have to get back to the temple, the oracles will miss me if I’m gone and Jashri gave me only a short time in the city.”
Meresia nodded. “Go, daughter.”
Vashi kissed Kadian, hugged her mother and sister and they watched her go. Kadian stayed only when Taras reminded him that if the two were spotted, Vashi would be in even more trouble. Meresia waited until lunch was done, then stood and spoke with her other daughter.
“Come, Thressia, let us go and speak with the Oracle.”
Meresia’s younger daughter was not yet ten years old but was already being groomed for her future as matriarch of the Edoi and warden-protectress of Abbia, the isle-city in the Bay of Lilies that all Edoi recognised as home even on their wanderings.
She walked through the streets, accompanied by her younger daughter. As she moved closer to the temple her thoughts turned darker, the reasons why the Oracle refused to see her seemed more like cowardice than anything else. Why would she deny her the time with her daughter? She had kept to their bargain since the day it had been struck.
Another oracle had been called and she realised there must be some kind of power struggle going on behind the temple walls. Jashri would not give up her position without a fight, and that posed a problem for every man, woman and child in the city. This went beyond clans and castes. Meresia knew this could destroy everything that had been created since Kaiene’s day.
Meresia walked through the temple grounds and into the tower where the oracles dwelled, deja vu washing over her. Darus’ guardians stood at the door and she briefly wondered if it was to keep people like her out or the oracles in. Since Jashri’s Purge, she suspected it was the latter and she wondered how Eirian and her sisters endured.
“I’m here to speak with Her Grace, Jashri the Found.”
“And you are?” One of the guards asked. He was the older of the two but oddly polite for one of Darus’ minions.
“Clanmother Meresia of the Ifunareki.”
“You’re not
expected.”
“I was at New Year but Darus refused me entry. I ask Lady Jashri be notified of my presence.”
The first guard vanished inside, shutting the large double doors behind his swishing tail. The second one had a stony gaze but the moment his elder colleague left, his face softened and she realised he was Edoi-born, if not raised.
“Do not expect to be allowed in, Clanmother. Only servants move freely these days.” He spoke their dialect as did one who had forgotten a language learned long ago. He tried to be respectful but stumbled over his words. “Darkness wanders in these halls and word is that Jashri has turned from Aia’s service.”
Meresia blinked. “What?”
“A new oracle has been found…but Jash-” he trailed off as the door opened and his colleague returned.
“You may enter, Clanmother. Come with me and I will accompany you to the High Oracle’s chambers. The girl must wait here.”
“It’s all right, Thress. I won’t be long. Go sit in the shade until I return.”
“As you wish, mother.”
Meresia climbed the stairs slowly and passed Vashi, she was descending and carrying her mistress’ finished lunch tray. For a split second mother and daughter’s eyes met and then they passed like kerash on the water. Not a word was spoken between them and yet Vashi suddenly wondered if there was a way out, if she could be released to go back to her family.
Jashri was sitting on her balcony with a long glass of iced water. The guardian announced Meresia and the High Oracle offered her a seat.
“Ah, Meresia. Has it truly been a year already?”
“Three hundred days pass quickly,” she replied, looking down on the city and the rainbow-creating falls. The view was beautiful but she had never felt comfortable in this place. It was too fixed, to stable, for her traveller’s soul.
“Yes,” Jashri caught the insinuation in the Edoi woman’s voice. “My apologies, but as I’m sure you understand, with the calling of a new oracle things have been busy here.”
“So I hear,” Meresia said. “Your Grace, I came to ask you for something.”
“A boon?” Jashri tried to chuckle but her voice had a tightness to it, a foreboding sense of denial. “I wasn’t aware granting those was in my powers.”
“This one is,” the Edoi woman said. “The Ifunareki, along with the other Edoi, have heard the prophecy from a woman indwelt by the Lady of the River. I ask, with all the respect and circumstance, that you release my daughter Adria, whom you call Sarivashi, so she might travel with us when we leave the city in a few days time.”
“An indwelt woman?” Jashri scoffed. “If a god’s avatar had decided to step on Ishvei’s World, don’t you think Aia would have told me of it?”
“I believe she may have told you but, if she did, I wonder if you listened.”
Jashri’s face darkened, her sightless sockets widening in surprise and anger, but lacking eyes, much of the emotional response was lost. Meresia wasn’t sure if she was angry or surprised, not until she stood up, took two steps forward and slapped the Edoi woman. “If you wish to live, Mere, never speak to me like that again.”
Meresia stopped and blinked. For a second she was taken back to a warm summer day, before her mother was so savagely murdered, and a cousin who was braiding her hair.
“Kia? Please. I hoped to appeal to my sister, not to the High Oracle.”
The colour drained from the High Oracle’s face. “I told you once before to never call me that. Ever. She’s dead.”
Meresia was emboldened by the blood rushing through her veins. “Kia, daughter of Ismena of the Cavari and Adria of the Ifunareki.” Meresia repeated. “We are blood-kin. That’s why you changed her name isn’t it? You couldn’t bear to be reminded of how my mother died, of how the Cavari did nothing. Would you see your own niece die with you in your foolishness? Would you be that callous?”
“Shut up!” Jashri’s voice was breaking. “Darus! Darus!”
The High Chamberlain burst in. Though a sadistic son of a baelish turd, Meresia realised the tiniest part of him still clung to his High Oracle even if she hated him in return. She was his stability in an unkind world and he would do her bidding because he was too well trained, too indoctrinated by the temple. “Your Grace?”
“Get. Her. Out.” The High Oracle almost screamed the words, each enunciated as its own exclamation of fury.
“Clanmother, come with me.” Darus escorted her out and as he was about to follow the guardians down the spiraling steps, Jashri called him back. “Darus.”
“Your Grace, did she harm you?”
“No.” Jashri tried to keep her voice under control and failed. “I have two tasks for you.”
“Anything.”
“Send someone to the Edoi district. Find this woman who believes herself indwelled by a god and bring her to me.”
“As you command,” he said. “And the second thing?”
“Find Sarivashi, then beat her to within an inch of her miserable life.”
After serving her mistress a late lunch and being dismissed, Sarivashi entered the library just as the librarians were hanging fresh lightstones in their wall-sockets. It wasn’t safe for flames so close to books and so lightstones were brought from the river Sani in the north at great expense. They charged in sun or moonlight and then were used when Thaeos set so scholars and clergy could read deep into the night.
She bobbed her head respectfully to old Beren, keeper of the books, and moved through the cool aisles. Relief flooded though her, no one had missed her or questioned her absence. Jashri hadn’t suspected a thing and she felt guilty, but as her handmaiden she was a keeper of secrets, what was one more? It was nice, almost, to have a secret of her own for a change, rather than one placed upon her by Eirian or Jashri herself.
She walked into the main courtyard which surrounded a smaller version of Ishvei’s statue, the one Jadias carved for the temple. On the floor was a map of the known lands and the nine cities, of Benai, Ossoi, Abbia, Fenoi, Kaithu, Sadrish, Baaren, Gehol and, of course, Aiaea itself. She strolled north, over the Southern Desert and salt flats, dancing across the various oases until she came to the Azure Grasslands. There she gazed for a moment at the isle-city of Abbia and the trading routes that marked the various caravans, momentarily remembering how the blue-purple grass would move like a wave as the diaphanous elokoi floated on the warm winds, held aloft by their delicate coloured wings.
She wondered if Meresia would succeed or if it was just false hope? Adria was dead, and no matter how Kadian and her mother might wish it, she couldn’t be resurrected. Her name was Sarivashi, a temple-bound servant, and she had a job to do. That said, something ate at her. Why had Jashri refused to let her meet her mother? Why had she changed her name all those years ago? What did she have against her mother?
Normally the library was not a place for servants, much less those like her, but Sarivashi served the High Oracle and when she or her sisters requested a text, it was Sarivashi who would have to find and read it to them. As a result, over the years, she had struck up a friendship with old Beren and his army of apprentices and they happily found any obscure texts requested in the name of her mistresses.
Aia help her, she felt dishonest, but despite her methods, Vashi was doing it for the right reasons. When her life was revisited, when she sat with Arvan in the great hall of records, of lives lived and those yet to be, the gods would see her intentions had been pure ones despite her under-handed methods.
The sacred section of the library, with its high shelves of rolled scrolls and stitched codices, was nearest to the statue on a high mezzanine. Incense burned gently, wafting towards the lightgate in the apex of the painted dome. Sarivashi loved to look at the stories: Aia’s sacrifice, the creation of the universe, and the myriad gods and their chosen worlds. At least half the roof focused on Ishvei as she moulded the land and people of her favoured planet.
Her mother had brought her up with tales of how, inspired by a creat
ure one of her siblings had created on their own world, Ishvei had used stone flecked with the essence of Aia to sculpt a creature of grace. She had created the Kashinai, the ‘star-kissed’, giving them long legs to run, a tail for balance, keen ears to hear prey, long, nimble fingers, an ieshiya to experience all the pleasures offered by the universe, and eyes to see the beauty of her world.
“Hello, Vashi-child, what brings you to my library on this beautiful afternoon?” Old Beren approached her with a tray in his hands, two cups and a pot of iced tea. This was their ritual and he always seemed to know she was coming.
“Afternoon, Father,” she said. “I come searching for knowledge, as always.”
“Then you will always be welcome here, child.” Beren poured the amber tea into the ceramic cups and pushed one towards her. “Drink, and tell me what codex you seek for our beloved oracles.”
“Father, Aia tells us to be honest always barring circumstances when you are trying to help those you love. Yet today I find myself tempted by dishonesty. Can I be truthful with you, knowing it is between us and the Disembodied Goddess?”
“Of course, daughter, I would never betray the trust of one who loves knowledge as much as you.”
“I seek forbidden knowledge.”
Beren scoffed. “There’s no such thing.”
“Then I look to remember what some have decided must be forgotten.”
“Ahhh.” Old Beren nodded in understanding and waited for her to continue.
“But I’m not sure I can find this knowledge in books.”
“Sometimes you need memory. Tell me, Vashi, what is it you want to know?”
“Why did the High Oracle banish all the attendants? Why the Purge?”
“Hmm.” Beren scratched his beard while she filled both their cups. “I was a little younger then but I remember the chaos her catharsis caused. Jashri ripped the heart out of this temple.”
“Any idea why?”
“I have my own beliefs, my own conclusions, but only Jashri will know if they are true,” he mused. “You know the mantle I once held?