by Don McQuinn
Silence fell like a physical weight. Gan raised his arms. His words were plain. “The Three Territories are faced with destruction.” He lowered his arms, stepped forward, as if speaking directly to each person present. “I’ve heard the rumors. Some say I bargain for my kingdom. Some tell stories that I would exchange gold and slaves for permission to rule the Three Territories. Hear the truth. If I could bargain honorably with our enemies to save lives, I would do so. Our enemies are implacable. The Skan and Windband want us for slaves, our lands for their own. What faces us in the spring is extermination.”
He paced back and forth, letting his declaration take root. “I know the Territories are ripped by uncertainty. I know there is dissension. There are those who wish to see me deposed. It may come to pass. But understand this: Any man living here who turns his hand against the Three Territories when the Skan and Windband mount their attack will be given to them. Naked. Alone. Such a man may live, but without family, clan, tribe, or nation. He will depend on the mercy of our enemies. He will cease to exist for all of us.”
A strange sound, almost a whistle, shimmered through the crowd. In a world where one’s entire life was tallied by one’s relationships, such a sentence was more horrible than any death. Sylah repressed a shudder, thinking how even a slave could identify an owner, and therefore feel he belonged. Gan’s dictum crushed even that cruel prospect. Sylah noticed Neela’s face. Determined not to embarrass her husband by admitting her own horror, Neela was steeled to immobility.
Intrigued, Sylah deliberately checked the reactions of the aliens. None showed the least concern. It was inconceivable to her that anyone could contemplate such loneliness without pain. Either the strangers were far better at hiding their feelings than she ever suspected, or there was something terribly wrong with them.
Gan continued. “Tomorrow morning riders will range the Territories, with orders for all men between sixteen and fifty to report to the local Barons. Emso and selected officers from the Wolves will train the new recruits. Others will raid Windband and their allies among the River People.” Pausing, Gan scanned the crowd. At last, he pointed. “Back there. Baron Fir, come all the way from our northern boundary; do you see any fools in this gathering?”
The crowd looked to Fir expectantly. He was momentarily nonplussed, and then the tight, shrewd face wrinkled in a grin. “No fool great enough to admit to foolishness.”
Light laughter moved through the crowd, and then Gan was pointing at another man. He shouted at him, “Otter South. A valiant warrior of the Eleven West barony. How about you? Any fools here?”
“No, Murdat.” Otter South was a tall, whip-lean man, and he growled his answer.
Gan said, “Then I tell you all this. Only a fool speaking to fools would promise victory in the war facing us. If I die, I die a free man, leading free men. Murdat abandons no wounded, Murdat trades no man or his property for advantage. I promise all who come to my Wolves one thing only: Honor.”
There were cheers. War cries. The instruments on the band platform blared mad song.
Some Barons and nobles of Altanar’s former kingdom were far more restrained. They registered their cheers, applause, cadenced war cries. A closer look caught surreptitious glances. In one instance, Sylah detected that most frightening display of duplicity, the covert smile.
With a hand on Sylah’s shoulder, Lanta pulled her down while rising on tiptoe. “You saw? Baron Ondrat. He smiled.”
“I saw.” Sylah cut her off, indicating Jaleeta with her eyes. Then, loud enough for the younger woman to overhear, “I thought he sounded wonderful, too. We will win. We’ll crush the Skan. And Windband.”
Conviction rang in Jaleeta’s agreement. “We must. If the Skan win, they’ll destroy the people of the Three Territories the way a weasel destroys roosting chickens.”
Lanta bristled. “They won’t win. And they’ll find they’ve attacked eagles.”
Sylah said, “I wonder how the Skan and Windband will react when the closeness of their relationship is tested. In defeat or victory, I think those two will find a way to avoid loving each other.”
“You only need concern yourself with one,” Jaleeta said. “If they lose, you’ll have the pleasure of watching them tear each other apart. If they win, they’ll go after each other, but only after they’ve torn us apart.”
“Don’t you have any friends among them?” Sylah asked, extending a sympathetic hand to rest on Jaleeta’s.
The reaction was explosive. Jaleeta’s face, her neck, her ears, all burned crimson, displacing even the glow of firelight. Her eyes narrowed, her lips tightened. Pure hatred gleamed in her expression. Sylah was fascinated to see how ugly the young woman became, and how quickly she reestablished control of herself. Mere anger took the place of malice, cold judgment took over for emotional excess. To Sylah and Lanta it was like watching an exquisitely played game. Jaleeta’s response was short. “The only human among the Skan is my mother.”
It was a lie. Dilating pupils shouted duplicity, the surging blood-beat under Sylah’s fingers mocked the false words.
The knowledge created more questions than answers. Could Jaleeta’s emotional connection with the unknown Skan person be helpful?
Movement at the corner of her eye ended Sylah’s contemplations. Louis Leclerc approached wearing an uncharacteristically broad grin. He moved past Sylah without a glance, stopping in front of Jaleeta. “I had to tell you how glad it makes me to see you looking so well. We were all worried about you when you first arrived. You’d been through a lot. Tonight you look wonderful.”
Jaleeta lowered her eyes decorously, gave shy thanks.
Turning her back in order to shield her words from Jaleeta, Lanta whispered, “Look at how she’s looking past him. She’s looking for someone.”
Preoccupied, amused, Sylah had missed what Lanta described. When Nalatan and Tate exchanged good-byes with Emso, Jaleeta appeared pleased. That reaction solidified as the couple advanced on her. Jaleeta looked at them, rather than Leclerc.
Greetings were exchanged. Leclerc remarked again on Jaleeta’s beauty, eliciting another pleased, flustered smile. Tate’s reaction was a speculative stare for the man.
Nalatan remained glum. His conversation was monosyllables and grunts. Tate rolled her eyes at Leclerc and Jaleeta in silent apology.
Jaleeta said to Leclerc, “Is your work going well? Will you make more things, so Gan can beat the Skan?”
Leclerc answered gravely, “Well, as Gan said, no one can promise victory. Still, I have some ideas that should help. New weapons.”
“Weapons don’t fight.” Nalatan glowered at everyone, but no one in particular. “Donnacee’s trip into the Enemy Mountains has something to do with weapons to save Gan Moondark. I know it does. I’m tired of talk about secrets and I’m tired of thinking about my wife risking her life for someone’s kingdom.” His blunt belligerence was like a cold deluge.
Tate took his arm in hers. She said, “I love you, too,” and the hard, frowning monk looked down at her and melted. He almost smiled. “I finally did it, didn’t I? Made a fool of myself.”
Tate cocked her head back, tilted it to the side. “I love you for it. That’s my burden.”
At that, Nalatan did smile. He pressed Tate’s arm to his side. Oblivious to the others, he led her away. She turned to wave, sent her friends a small expression of resignation, and shrugged.
The others laughed, the tense moment past. Leclerc invited Jaleeta to visit his workshop the next morning. The two of them walked off, conversing animatedly. Sylah and Lanta waited a moment, then trailed after them, part of the crowd moving into the night. At the door leading outside, Jaleeta turned.
Sylah shoved her friend aside, hiding with her in the shadows. Lanta understood immediately. Together, they watched the couple.
Jaleeta’s back was to Leclerc, who stood beaming, waiting patiently. The young woman’s gaze swept the room’s occupants as a hawk scans a roost of songbirds. She watched Emso, chat
ting with Gan and a circle of Barons by the firepit nearest the stage. She sought out Nalatan just as he walked through another door with Tate on his arm. A faint, contemplative smile moved Jaleeta’s lips. A startling pink tongue, shining like a jewel, slipped between them. Lazily, sensuously, it slipped from side to side, wetting her lips until they, too, appeared enamel-bright. Then she laughed and turned back to Leclerc. Silvery peals spangled the air behind her as she disappeared into the darkness with him.
Chapter 7
The young Priestess stood in the middle of Sylah’s sparse quarters. She towered over Sylah, trembling nervously, her robe literally moving with her body. White hands, peering out of the deep sleeves of her crossed arms, squirmed like two mice trying to retreat into grain sacks. She stammered as she repeated her story for Sylah. “The one who told me to come to you is the War Healer on her way from Church Home to the White Bear People. She’s been with us since just after you and the others came. We all thought she was bad Church, but she was just finding out who liked you and who liked the Abbess, so…”
“That’s the second time you said ‘bad’ Church. There is no such thing. We’re divided, but we’ll come together. As sisters, not as victors and vanquished. Now, go on.”
The apologetic Priestess bobbed industriously. A glance at Sylah’s mounting irritation started her tale again. “As soon as the War Healer was convinced I favored you, she gave me the folded paper. She said you’d understand when you opened it. Then she told me I had to bring you a message.” The gawky woman stopped. She swallowed hard, then, “She said for you to be at the street of the potters tonight between first and second watch. If you can’t be there tonight, then tomorrow night. The one who’s to meet you said: ‘The marked one sends harm.’” The Priestess looked questioningly at Sylah, consumed by curiosity about the trenchant words.
Sylah gestured at the leather flagon hanging on the back of the door. “There’s wine in that. Drink some. You need it.” Looking away then, Sylah pursed her lips. The “marked one” could only be Odeel, the former Harvester who now claimed to be Sister Mother. Remembering the night she’d put the forbidden mark of the cross on Odeel, Sylah repressed a shudder. Once more, she saw barbaric ceremony, unspeakably cruel execution. She marked Odeel because she was part of that obscene performance.
Fury burned in her. A Church official—now the most honored of all Church officials—part of that. It was unacceptable. Wrong.
Sylah turned to the Priestess, who was just putting down a ceramic cup. Sylah said, “What do you know of this traveling War Healer?”
“Nothing I haven’t told you, Rose Priestess.” A swift twist of reservation marred the young woman’s features. “I didn’t want to tell her I favor you over the old Church ways. I didn’t want to bring you that folded paper, nor any message either. She wormed things out of me. Then she bullied me. She’s mean, sister; smooth as cream, tougher than bull hide.”
Sylah had to laugh at the other’s righteous indignation. She moved to her, put an arm around her waist to walk her the few steps to the door. “There’s need in our garden for every blossom. We need her for what she is. We need you just as much for what you are. Go back to your abbey. Forget what’s happened.” After a significant pause, Sylah added, “My friend.”
The tall Priestess turned, transformed. The awkward posture disappeared, the taut mannerisms ceased. Her face, heretofore plain and not particularly becoming, was wreathed in a bright, confiding smile. Her steady gaze held character. “I am your friend, sister. Oh, I’m afraid, and I know I’m not clever or quick-spoken, but I still want to help. I’m a strong, hard worker, and I think I can be as brave as anyone. I’ll try, anyhow. Because you’re good. You work for all women. You say the garden needs us. Most of all, it needs our Flower.” Abruptly, she stopped, bent to kiss Sylah’s forehead. And was gone.
Slowly, bowed with the weight of her thoughts, Sylah pushed the door closed. She made her way to the chair by the small table under the shuttered window. Despite the midday hour, inclement weather afforded no chance to open the place to more light. The room was dull, its few touches of color muted. A candle on the table jittered. Rags jammed into the spaces between wooden shutter and stone wall failed to eliminate the tormenting draft.
“Prisoner.” In the silence of her thoughts it was just a word, a description. Aloud, it resonated off the stones, the structural timbers. “So much hope,” Sylah whispered. “So many people, so desperate for someone to show the way. Why me? I’m unworthy. I’m afraid. So lonely.”
I will not be owned.
Unbidden, unwelcome, that old credo hammered at her inner being. Tears burned her eyes. “Does that mean I must be denied my husband’s arms? Does that mean I must always be the one to resist, to stand up? Is it too much to simply be me? I want to know life, not service. I want to live.”
A meeting with an unknown person. A conspirator. A need—a demand—for secrecy. If Sylah was to live, she would spurn such a plan without pause. It promised death.
So many enemies. So many friends.
The Flower was Sylah. The Flower had no choice.
Who would wait in the darkness?
Sound distracted her. A crackling, crisp noise. It took time for Sylah to realize it was the small paper envelope, crushed in a clenching fist. Blinking back tears, she opened the neatly folded paper. Inside was a flower. Fragrance rose from it, sweet, enticing. A rose, one of the plain ones the gardeners called first roses, saying all others descended from the type. Sylah held the paper close, savored the fragrance. Roses. Someone nailed roses to her door once. It seemed generations had passed since then. Those roses had been a warning.
* * *
The pressure of watching eyes worried the back of Sylah’s neck as insistently as the chill mist forged into the dark cave of her raised cowl.
She stopped abruptly, whirling to catch whoever followed her. The bottom of her flowing robe, sodden with rain, flared out like a black blossom opening against the night. Heavy cloth expelled arcs of water with a scornful hiss. A distant shadow, darker than the darkness—something confused her eye, tricked her mind. There was nothing conclusive.
One of the new communal baths Gan required in every poor neighborhood was just at the end of the block. Only a while ago this same street would have been busy with people. This late, long after the evening meal, few people ventured into a cold, windy rain.
Sylah resumed her walk. Experience warned that she heed the odd, tingling sensation of imminent danger. She smiled ruefully in the depths of the hood; she might not have Lanta’s Seeing talent, but she had a bird’s sense of nearby predators.
Someone in the darkness stalked her. Her warrior husband lectured that the predator misses far more often than it kills. Wary prey survives. Usually.
“The marked one sends harm,” the War Healer from Church Home said. Grimly, Sylah remembered how freely the new Sister Mother dispensed harm.
The thought added speed to Sylah’s progress. Instinct demanded she run, but the pursuer’s stalk decided her against that. Whoever it was, he hung back. Ever since she crossed the open ground outside the castle walls and entered the town proper, he had been there. Too far to harm, close enough to become dangerous quickly. That suggested someone ahead, as well. Waiting.
Hanging wooden shop signs rattled and banged erratically at unpredictable wind gusts. Rain whispered against the brick walls and stone streets, drummed on the tile roofs. Few lights broke the oppressive blackness. Sensible people were indoors, warm and dry, shutters drawn against the increasing violence of the storm. The odd lighted window filtered the ruddy touch of open flame through pieced, multihued glass panes. Jewel like, they provided color, not illumination, reinforcing the unworldliness of the narrow urban canyons.
Sylah determined to lose whoever followed her. They were in the poorest section of the city. Buildings were much closer together. Some of the precise geometry of Ola’s street pattern suffered a bit of freehand diversity. Heart pounding, sh
e darted through warrenlike alleys. Once she found herself in a dead end. Shaken, she huddled for long moments, straining to hear the footsteps that meant entrapment. When none came, she made her way back out. Her course was generally in the direction of the street of the potters, marked by random twists and doublings.
The meeting site loomed unexpectedly, the orderly rooflines of two arcades. She hurried under the nearest, out of the rain at last. Cautiously, feeling her way from support post to post, Sylah crept the silent length of the arcade. Distant lightning flashed. The brief light was welcome. She hated the ensuing thunder because it might cover the sound of surreptitious approach.
Immediately after one flash, before the thunder came, she heard her name. A high voice, strained. Female? A man disguising his normal tones?
Sylah answered, “I am Sylah. Who calls?”
“A friend. I come to warn you.” The speaker had an odd speech pattern, rising and falling tones that reminded Sylah of the Kossiars, far to the south.
Sylah said, “The message warned me already. Tell me who you are, where you’re from.”
“I’m here to give you names of our enemies.”
Sylah peered into the darkness, fixing the location of the speaker. “Anyone can speak names.”
“They’re not to be spoken aloud after I give them to you. The only other people who know them are Sister Mother and her Seer. I also come to warn you of two plots. One is against you. The other is against Gan Moondark.”
Frowning, Sylah turned to the right. The speaker seemed to have moved a few paces. “Only two? Surely we’re worth more.”
“Probably. The Seer spoke of two.” The voice was unperturbed by Sylah’s sarcasm. More than that, it was moved, off to the left. “For Gan Moondark, the Seer spoke to Sister Mother of poison. She saw trust. Affection; almost love. In a moment of great triumph, she Saw the poison do its work.”