The Book of the Ler

by M. A. Foster

  “Why Sanjirmil?”

  “They don’t really resemble one another, but there are enough basic similarities that in a vague-image it would confuse them in your mind.”

  “Hm. No, thank you, Fel, no Multispeech, if you please. If I have to put up with that, I want something good for the indignity. We’ll want a good one, from someone who knew her well. Recently. We should start, I suppose, with the Perklarens, and then go on to her friends, lovers, and the like. . . . Fellir, I really do smell something unsavory here, and I want to talk to some of them first, to see if I can feel out what we are getting into. Danger, the Perwathwiy said, and hedged when it was referred to us.”

  “Indeed. I feel similarly. This could be a sticky business, one you and I really have no business in. And . . .”

  “And?”

  “I don’t know why it should all be so mysterious. I mean, from Perwathwiy. And why not her own Braid, Morlenden?”

  “Yes, go on.”

  “It’s . . . deceptive. We haven’t been told everything.”

  “We’ve been told damn near nothing.”

  “What’s the word I’m looking for? It’s something that draws attention, but it’s not the real thing.”

  “Decoys,” he said, after a pause. “So how do you call it?”

  “I say start inside, soon, today, if you feel up to it. Tomorrow, for certain, no later. I’ll await you and return to the Institute and see what I can find.”

  Morlenden groaned aloud. “Back on the road! What a beast you’ve become!”

  “Don’t complain so. I’ve got to go back, too, and but for the walking, you have the easy part.”

  “You always say that, Fel, but the mono never seems to go to the places I have to visit. At the least, you get to ride.”

  “You wouldn’t like the environment. I’ve been outside, and I know. I don’t like it.”

  “All right, then, settled.” He paused for a moment, motioning to her to start leaving the recordium. As she turned and opened the door, he said, half to himself, “And if I get started, I can get there tonight.”

  Fellirian turned around. “Where?”

  “The Perklarens, of course.”

  The two of them left the recordium and closed the door securely. Then, with the help of Kaldherman and Cannialin, they began to assemble the things Morlenden would need for a short-notice trip upcountry. Some food, extra clothing, an undershift for winter. His worn rucksack. Kaldherman accompanied him out into the yard, where the morning was wearing on into midday.

  “You sure you don’t need some help?”

  “Not now, anyway. This shouldn’t be anything but a brisk walk, some talk, some more walking. But never fear, Kal. Later on, this may require all of us.”

  “Strokes and blows, perhaps?”

  “Eyes and ears and sharp wits, which you’ve as much of as fists and truncheons. Be ready! and I’ll be back in a day or so.”

  “It will be as you say . . . keep your eyes open, yourself, Mor. It would appear there’s something afoot. There may be those who don’t care for your questions.”

  “I’ll do that.” He waved at Kaldherman and set off.

  SEVEN

  The Game requires for definition five parameters that describe any conceivable individually specified game. These are: Dimension, Tesselation, States, Surround, and Transition-processes. There are two more supplementary parameters, nondefining, which are necessary to operate a given game. These two are Symbolism and Analysis.

  Dimension sets the dimensional matrix in which a Game occurs—within a linear sequence, upon a surface, throughout a solid, in and about an n-dimensional matrix. Tesselation defines how the dimension is subdivided. Linear sequences subdivide into bauds, which are the cellular units. Surfaces subdivide into familiar plane geometric figures, such as triangles, tetragons, pentagons, (never regular) and hexagons; but one should bear in mind that there can be many surfaces that are still two-dimensional. There are Euclidean surfaces, and also hyperbolic, parabolic, ellipsoidal, and spherical. Similar breakdowns also occur in volumes and n-dimensional matrices.

  We have spoken of things that have either theoretical or practical limits. Now come parameters that have no limits of either kind. State refers to the number of conditions possible to a cell; it can be the most simple—as binary, on and off—or each cell can assume more states. In certain Games, different cells may even have differing states. Surround is that number of surrounding cells that influence and cause changes of state in a given reference cell. A Surround might be immediately adjacent to the reference cell; likewise, it also might be deployed some distance from the reference cell. It could also be asymmetrical, or changing.

  Transition-processes are the rules that determine change. They may be as simple or as complex as one desires: simple summations with distributions of actions determined by decision-points on a probability curve of distributions. Or they might be instructional programs with hundreds of steps and subprocesses. Interweaving both summation of conditions in the surrounding cells with consideration of the position of these conditions.

  Symbolism pertains to the system by which one orders one’s perception of these parameters. Analysis is the study, comprehension, and prediction of whole-conditions within a Game. Symbolism and Analysis, considered in the abstract, define nothing; but without them, nothing can become, in our minds, which is the only theater of action.

  —Elementary Definitions

  MORLENDEN SET OUT walking in the ground-covering stride he used for distance walks to the more remote portions of the reservation, reviewing in his mind as he went the things he wanted to determine or, at the least, build a handle on. When he had a complex problem to consider, he could become quite oblivious to his surroundings, and this time was such an occasion; he disregarded, and then ignored, all of the things he usually looked for along his trips in the field: certain angles of view across fields, patterns of sunlight into groves of trees, hills and knolls of unique shape whose aspect had not been noticed before. This was a common diversion among the ler of all ages, and indeed, an elaborately structured art form was built upon this Aspectualism, as they sometimes referred to it. Morlenden was no dedicated savant of the art, nor of its near relative, the Practice of Subtle Bowering; nevertheless he was fond of dabbling in Aspectualism, and always recalled especially fine places he had discovered along his many travels within the reservation.

  He became so absorbed in the problem at hand that he quite forgot in what direction he was heading, and the rate of his progression, and before he could notice it, he had progressed quite far northward and westward along the Main Central Longitudinal Path, and had, in fact, began to angle downward into the valley of the Hvar. Long, open vistas across open fields began to replace the hill-and-dale views that had been passing by him unnoticed. While this progress pleased him greatly, as it was cutting down the time he would have to be on the road, he recalled with a jerk, stopping suddenly in the middle of the path, that the Perwathwiy and Sanjirmil had also departed northward along the same pathway, and had only about two hours’ start on him. The Perwathwiy was a hardy old goat, he thought, but not all that fast on the road. And he did not wish to meet either of them again today, especially Sanjirmil. True, many years had passed, and little contact had occurred between them, yet Morlenden also remembered vividly. And just as vividly remembered the Sanjirmil of the last twenty-four hours, with her dour, pinched, unreadable expression, and her brooding, withdrawn silences . . . not the best of circumstances in which to sit together in a sunny glade along the path and reminisce about the sweaty pleasures of the past, the soaring flights of emotion they had known for the short time allotted to them, the dreams and fantasies they had whiled away the days with. He had always wanted to see her again; but today did not seem appropriate. There had fallen an opaque screen between them, and through it he could glimpse her shadow only dimly. She had seemed to have the same problem seeing him. . . .

  Morlenden looked ahead, and acros
s the lower country immediately to the west, falling away to the line of trees that hid the watercourse of the Hvar. Today, now, everything seemed empty and peaceful, devoid of throngs, bands, and solitaries. The only sign of life he could see was some faint smoke far to the west, a bluish, smudgy haze, as if someone had a late smokehouse going. He reflected, looking about for cues from the landscape. Yes, he thought, orienting himself effortlessly out of the detailed mnemonic landscape built upon total recall of thousands of trips. This would be the country of Velsozlun, where conjoined the Hvar and the Garvey. Just ahead. And the smoke would be most likely of the forge of Braid Sidhen, the ironworkers, or the Kvemen, the charcoaleers. Fine people, salt of the Earth. Ought to drop in on the way back, just to say hello.

  But not today. He had a long way to go yet. Morlenden started off, resuming his long stride, picking up speed slowly, feeling the right pace set in, at last swiftly moving down toward the joining of the rivers.

  For a time some new-growth trees and the turnings of the pathway obscured his distant view, but it was no matter; the air was fine and crisp, the sky was clear, and the afternoon slants of sunlight across the valley of the Hvar lent a subtle, old-gold patina across the aspects of bare trunks and branches, drifts of fallen leaves, quick flashes of hints of openness, and a deepening of tone in the shadows and tree-crowded forest, as if the whole were under water of the most crystalline clarity. He began to feel expansive and energetic, and confidently strode forward.

  Ahead, the path lowered, curved, straightened for its plunge across the Terbruz, the double bridges across the Hvar and the Garvey, just above their confluence. Beyond, the pathway turned to the left, changing its direction more to the west. Morlenden stopped abruptly, peering ahead, all enjoyment suddenly set aside. On the point between the rivers a figure was standing, as if in contemplation, the recognition patterns of its stance and clothing broken up by a spattering of shadows from the liriodendrons across the Hvar, and the leaves on the ground, dropped by the winds. The person was not turned so that he or she could see him. Morlenden walked very slowly, as silently as he could, letting his drift take him toward cover as he moved closer to the Terbruz. Time began to slow, and his sense of progress with it. Sun, so still and fixed, began to crawl across the sky. The shadows lengthened. Morlenden crept as close as he dared. The still figure remained as if carved from an old deodar stump.

  The afternoon wore on fractionally. Without anticipation, the person ahead suddenly moved, as if unfreezing, flexed itself, and looked about. Perwathwiy! The old woman looked about, as if reassuring herself that she had not been observed. What had she been doing? Meditating? Morlenden did not know. She set out confidently, if somewhat slowly and carefully, not across the bridges, but northward along a barely visible pathlet running between the rivers. Morlenden remained where he was, sure that she had not seen him, for her glance had been cursory, a quick scan across the directions, nothing more. He felt embarrassed, hiding from an old woman. He watched the Perwathwiy fading into the distant jumble of undergrowth and tangled hillside, finally disappearing. He straightened. Not once had she looked back. He began moving forward, watching cautiously, listening. No. She was gone, out of sight. He resumed his walk, his gestalt perceptions shouting a fact at him. Sanjirmil had not been with the old woman.

  Something about this nagged at his mind. He dismissed it. Why should she remain with the Perwathwiy? Her business was done—she had witnessed for the active Players, Perklaren and Terklaren alike, although Morlenden felt uncomfortable with that as well. Why should a rival witness for another Braid? For the moment, he dismissed this as another odd quirk of the eccentric Player Braids, and continued along his way into the golden light of the late afternoon west, passing under the great, tall boles of the riverside liriodendrons. True, this dismissal, he realized, was but provisional, but so was so much else in life, and he had miles yet to walk. He emerged into the open and increased his pace.

  Perhaps, he thought, with a sly little chuckle, Sanjir has found someone else who will whisper “Ajimi” softly in her caramel-colored ear.

  The sun drifted, settled, waddled along the horizon bristling with tree branches, reddened in the industrial haze out of the far west, and faded as one looked at it. Morlenden did not stop for supper, preferring to continue and go as far as he could. Twilight lingered, deepened. Night came and the stars came out. All vestiges of afterglow vanished from the west and north. It grew colder. The air, mostly calm all day, grew utterly still. Morlenden’s hearing expanded in the crystalline darkness, reaching out into the passing country, evolving from fields and alternating forests to a country even more sparsely habited and partially returned to the wild. He thought he could glimpse, under the stars and the sky-glow along the horizon, the bulking of the ridgeline that terminated in the fabled Mountain of Madness, Grozgor. Morlenden shivered, not entirely from the cold, for he was walking along at a hard, driving pace, now. No, not the cold. They didn’t venture along the slopes of Grozgor, none of them. There were tales, superstitions, legends. The whole reservation was riddled with ancient ghost stories learned from the last of the humans who had lived in the area, and passed on unforgotten and embellished for several hundred years. Of course he did not believe all of them. But neither did he care to cross Grozgor at night. It was reputed to be the haunt of Players taken by strange and fey moods—they came at night to restore their vision, whatever one could make of that.

  The yos of the Braid Perklaren was located in the northwest of the reservation, close under the southern slope of Grozgor. Across the mountain, the ridgeline, lay the holding of the Terklarens. Not far away, north and east somewhere, was Dragonfly Lodge. More to the east was the holding of the Reven, the ruling Braid. Morlenden had never been to any of them before. This was called the lake country, although the arm of the lake that had once extended eastward from the Yadh to the west had long since silted up and been allowed to lower and dry out, forming a rich, though narrow plain, interrupted by ponds. Here the country was given over to pine cover, much of it of a variety of pine that formed, at maturity, dense, umbrellalike canopies high up at the top of the trunks. This cover lent the land a hushed, covered quality, deep in shade, the dense canopy overhead seldom permitting much light to enter. At night, the high fronds shut out all light, making a dense and impenetrable darkness in which Morlenden found some difficulty navigating.

  Here, as in the rest of the reservation, they did not form towns, for at the heart of the ler way of life lay the canons of agricultural self-sufficiency. No matter what their role in the extended, low-density city that encompassed the entire society, each Braid and elder commune was expected to be in part a farmer, The solitaries became hunters and gatherers. Nevertheless, in certain areas, increases of density did occur. The lake country was one such area, as was Morlenden’s own neighborhood, the Flint Mountain area.

  Under the trees, then, he could catch an occasional flash of light, broken up by the habit of the locals of situating their dwellings in the middle of the densest groves of the oldest pines. But no more than those narrow, fleeting glimpses. Earlier, he had stopped and inquired of the location of the Perklarens, but now, in the dark, with landmarks gone, he wasn’t so sure. And the still air was getting noticeably colder; there would be frost-heaves in the ground tomorrow. He passed a junction of the innumerable subtle pathways under the trees, an odd angle that seemed familiar, turned in the recommended direction. After an interminable stumbling walk, at last he arrived in the dooryard of someone’s yos; whose, it would remain to be seen.

  Morlenden stared ahead in the gloom under the trees; here the meshed umbrellalike canopy overhead was so dense he could see virtually nothing, save the rounded shapes of the yos directly ahead. According to his directions, the Perklarens had cultivated a privet-ligustrum as their ornamental yard-tree. If he could find that . . . yes, there was the pot. He moved closer, trying to make out the shape of it, looking for clues. And yes, sure enough, that was what it was, an ancient pr
ivet-ligustrum so large it could not be taken in at a glance, its semievergreen canopy spreading overhead and blending invisibly with the dark canopy. He turned toward the yos somewhat more confidently. Dark or not, he would go up and bang on the door-gong. Dense under here, he thought. Morlenden was as fond of his shade as the next during the hot, bright days of summer, but he also liked to have a window open on the sky; he sensed something oppressive and closed in, dark and brooding, here under the pines. He also reflected that the wind would sound much differently here. And in the yos? There were lights in the back, not so many in the front. Missing was that sense of suppertime business, coming and going, the sounds of voices; the yos seemed enveloped in an air of half-abandonment, despite the lights. In fact, it seemed almost as if no one were at home.

  Morlenden climbed the stairs to the entryway and pulled upon the thong of the guest-bell, this one being a weighty and impressive terracotta affair suspended from a bracket that could have held up the whole yos. The bell rang with a deep, hollow, plangent reverberation that seemed to spread and die away, a soft, yet penetrating pulse of sound. The after-vibrations in the bell could not be heard, but they could be felt, and they continued, long after the original sound had faded away. He was about to ring it again, receiving no answer to the first, when at last a face appeared at the door-flap. It was a plain, very pale, rather awkwardly square face, framed in tousled, curly brown hair. The face peeped out farther. It was a girl, he thought.

  “Yes?” she asked.

  “Is this the yos of Klanh Perklaren?”

  “Yes, it is,” she admitted blandly. No more information was offered. The girl seemed to be slightly irritated with him for being there. In a similar fashion, Morlenden likewise began to feel a slight irritation beginning to rise in himself. Here, of all places, what should he meet but the most bland and literal-minded of evasiveness. This infuriating oblique girl could keep him standing outside in the night forever while he asked question after question.