by Shannah Jay
'Oh, but you are! Whether you like it or not, you belong to our community now. Dsheresh Kashal is your home, and here no one is allowed to set personal desires above the needs of the group. That's our law. The Council's wishes are paramount and this year, I'm the appointed leader.'
She raised a hand slowly, focusing her will upon the muscles in her arm, and he took a hasty step backwards, as if fearing she was going to attack him again.
Herra made a series of rapid arm movements.
Again he flinched back. 'If you dare disobey my lawful commands, we shall have to give you some daily potion until you settle down. We've been very patient with you so far, lady, very patient indeed. We've allowed you plenty of time to recover. But the community's need is urgent and you are now summoned before the Council to have your particulars taken.'
'What need?'
'I told you that yesterday! We're short of women here. That's why we were - are - so delighted to see you.'
His voice softened and became coaxing. 'There's absolutely nothing to fear, my dear. When you've seen the Council, you'll be assigned to a partner for the rest of the year, given your own hut, and then you'll feel much more at home.'
She turned to face him, her anger glowing in her eyes.
He backed away. 'You're being unreasonable! You can be very happy here!'
'I don't seek personal happiness, thank you. And I've no intention of staying here. What's more, the last thing I want is a sexual partner. At my age, indeed! Your Council may request me to join them, if they wish to speak to me, and I may or may not do so, but they’ve no right to summon me, let alone dictate what I do with my life.' She pointed a very steady finger at him. 'Go away and give them my message!'
Spluttering with rage, he snatched at the door handle and yelled, 'Guards! Guards!'
The door banged open and two brawny young men rushed in. Herra stilled them with one snap of her fingers, then turned to Sarm. ' I am Elder Sister of Temple Tenebrak and I obey no one but my Brother the God. Only he may command me! ' Her voice rang with power, her eyes flashed dangerously and a wind howled around the outside of the hut, setting the walls of woven mats flapping like live things.
A contemptuous snap of her fingers released the two guards, who staggered for a moment, then gasped and moved back, staring at Herra as if she had grown a second head.
'What did you do to them?' whispered Sarm. 'What unwomanly arts are these?' He drew a deep breath and started again, but with less conviction. 'How dare you resist the will of the community!'
'I shall argue no more!' Herra declared, and her wind blew right into the room, whirling dust and leaves into the corners, pressing the men's tunics against their bodies. 'I repeat: I am not of your community, and I deny that you have any rights over me.'
As he opened his mouth to argue, there was a shout from the street. 'The SS'Habi! The SS'Habi are coming!'
Fear leaped into Sarm's bulbous brown eyes. 'Now, look what you've done! I told you the deleff would countenance no trouble! We must all be peaceful and live together in harmony, or they'll punish us! And even you won’t be able to resist them!'
All was confusion in the street outside, as people rushed to shelter in the nearest hut, fathers scooping up children en route.
As Sarm moved towards the door, he waggled his finger in Herra's direction. 'You'd better stay here, where you will be safe! It is for me, and me alone, to speak to the SS'Habi.'
Chest puffed out importantly, he left the hut and went to stand in the middle of the street in front of a turbulence starred with blue sparks. Herra could sense his nervousness but gave him credit for overcoming it.
She followed him outside and stood under a tree watching as a blue glow appeared in the centre of the turbulence, growing larger and brighter, until forms could be seen moving inside it. The light became so blinding she had to shield her eyes. When it died down three SS'Habi were standing on a low platform.
Sarm went towards them, bowing and scraping, uttering such fulsome expressions of delight at the honour of this visit that Herra cringed to hear him.
She moved out into the street and as she approached the SS’Habi, the cream Sister's robe they had provided swirled around her ankles in currents of air that seemed to emanate from beneath the platform.
Sarm, face puce with anger he dared not express, made urgent signs to her to get back, but she ignored him. No one else approached the platform.
'High Council iss dissturbed,' the Elder SS'Habi stated, totally ignoring Sarm. 'Emanations of disscord come from thiss place. Iss not allowed. Not!'
'Our deepest apologies, honoured ones,' Sarm said. 'It's all the fault of this new woman, who refuses to obey the rightful wishes of the community. She shall be given potion and it won’t happen again.'
The SS'Habi spoke directly to Herra. 'Elder Ssisster, why iss trouble? Iss not allowed.'
'I didn't make trouble. It was this man who ordered me to do unseemly things. I cannot live in this community, Elder SS'Habi. The ways of these people distress me greatly. And to give me potion would distress me even more. The emanations from that would be very violent!'
Two of the SS'Habi's legs writhed in the air. 'Potion makes people happy. Iss gift of Giver of Words to people of Dsheresh Kashal.'
'You're wrong. Potion doesn't make people happy. Who told you that it did? Potion just numbs them, and stops them from thinking. That's a form of coercion. I won't allow it to happen to me. I will not allow it!'
The legs writhed in agitation. 'Mussst not disturb Giver of Words. Musst not! Elder Ssisster has powerful emanations today. Very bad. Very unpeaceful. Ssense from far away. Musst not!'
'Then allow me to leave here and stay somewhere else until my friends have recovered. And stop these people from harming me. They will not let me be peaceful!'
The SS'Habi conferred with each other and their hissing and whispering sounded ominous to Herra.
'Iss nowhere else Elder Ssisster can go. Thiss one regrets necessity, Elder Ssisster. Deeply regrets. But musst stop violence. Musst. Iss dangerous time. Not in true alignment.'
'Your potion is itself a form of violence.' She glared at them.
An outburst of hissing and chittering erupted from the platform, and when it died down the Elder SS'Habi made a gesture to Sarm. 'Fetch potion, Captal. Giver of Words musst have peace at this time. Musst. Elder Sister iss held.'
Herra tried to move away, but found herself caught by some invisible force. She attempted to speak and could not. Sarm smiled triumphantly at her and shouted an order for someone to bring a large bowl of potion.
Refusing to panic, Herra closed her eyes and summoned up the forces within her. Dear Brother, I have extreme need of your help at this time! Lend me the strength to resist these creatures. Her body began to tingle and strange energies flickered at the edges of her vision. Gradually she regained enough control of herself to form words. 'This - is - wrong! It's wrong to use force against me, Elder SS'Habi!'
'Musst have peace now. Musst. Can do nothing else. Thiss one much regrets necessity.'
Narla walked slowly towards the small group bearing a red-glazed bowl before her, which she handed to Sarm. She threw a pitying glance at Herra, then looked down and moved away.
With a gloating expression on his face, Sarm moved towards Herra, speaking to the SS'Habi. 'I shall give it to her, then deal with her myself.' His raised his voice. 'When they release her, I think we shall need six guards until the potion takes effect. She's a very strong woman. Jeml, fetch your whole squad here at once.'
A group of men moved forward, their eyes mirroring the expectation in Sarm's, their movements jerky with excitement.
Herra spoke sharply. Every moment increased her control over her body. 'The Giver of Words will feel even more pain if they try to give me potion, Elder SS'Habi. I will not obey them. I will fight against them always. There will be much violence!'
A haze of blue light flickered around the platform, pulsating like a live thing. 'Give potion
quickly, Captal.
Violent thoughts are painful to all.'
The force holding Herra's body slackened and the six men rushed forward. She made no attempt to still them as they seized her, but the bowl in Sarm's hands suddenly shattered into a myriad pieces and he shouted in panic as he was drenched by the thick sticky liquid.
The force field descended again, catching the guards as well as Herra. She could feel a pulse beating in her temple, a power surging through her veins. ' No!' she cried, and her voice seemed to echo, even in that open space. ' You are wrong, SS'Habi, wrong!' Slowly, very slowly, she began to move towards the platform, slipping out of the paralysed hands that had been clutching her. The SS'Habi seemed frozen in astonishment, then, as she drew closer, they began to hiss and twitter.
'Sstop!' called the Elder SS'Habi. 'Sstop, Elder Ssisster!'
'Then stop forcing violence upon me. The very idea of potion hurts me.' She projected the disgust and horror she felt as strongly as she could and the light around the platform began to flicker. 'The very idea of living in this community hurts me!' she cried, still in that penetrating voice, her words bounced to and fro by the echo. 'I feel anguish - pain - loathing.' She threw the words towards the platform as if they were weapons.
'Elder SS'Habi, how can you do this to me? How can you hurt me so? Feel my anguish! Feel it! '
The platform winked suddenly out of sight and there was a clap of thunder over the village. Only when the last reverberation had died away did Herra turn around. Everyone except Narla fell back before her.
' Leave me! ' she commanded, and the squad of men hurried to obey her. Their fear made the Compulsion superfluous. ' Leave! All except Narla. ' Last of all went Sarm, his feet stiff and reluctant. The malevolent look he cast back at Herra boded no good to her if he should ever get the whip hand again.
Narla stood a little way from Herra, shaking visibly.
'What will they do next?' asked Herra. 'Child, don't tremble before me. I won't force you to stay with me, or even to speak to me, if you're afraid. But if you can tell me anything, help me in any way at all . . . '
Narla took a deep breath, glanced over her shoulder, then seemed to make up her mind. 'I'll stay, Elder Sister. But I don't think I’ll be of much use to you, for I don't know what they'll do next. How did you manage to move?'
'My Brother lent me his strength,' said Herra. 'I knew it’d be very wrong for me to drink potion. It’d damage my powers, slow down my thinking. Perhaps that's why your mother didn't manage to hold out against them.'
'How does one learn such magic? My mother wasn't strong enough to resist, and yet she was a Sister once.'
'It's not magic. Magic is a concept for children and fools. Our skills are Disciplines which take many years of practice and can only be achieved if one has the right Gifts within oneself. I'm fortunate enough to belong to a very Gifted Line. Our Brother has been exceptionally kind to me, granting me many of my Line's Gifts.'
'Oh. I was hoping that you could show me some of your magic.' Disappointment made tears spring to Narla's eyes. 'They'll punish me for staying to speak to you, Elder Sister. They'll give me potion. I thought your magic would protect me.'
'Is that why you stayed, dear child? Leave me, if you wish. I'll not stop you.'
'I don't know why I stayed. It just - it seemed the right thing to do. And - and besides, I don't want to leave you. I don't want to go back to them. I'm ready to leave Dsheresh Kashal, more than ready, Elder Sister. Even if I have to flee to the desert.'
Herra laid a hand briefly on Narla's head. 'If you’d grown up in the Claims, you would have been chosen as a Sister of the God. You too have Gifts, Narla Nel-Kereth, young as you are.'
'I'm not young. I'm twenty-six.'
'And you’ve had six children already! That's so wrong. This is an unbalanced way of life.'
Narla looked wonderingly at Herra. 'Did you mean what you said? Would I really have been chosen?'
'Certainly I meant it! Does the idea of becoming a Sister please you?'
'Oh, yes. Very much. My mother used to visit us and tell me what it was like in Temple Fenlanik, but only when father was away, of course. The men didn't like her remembering - or visiting me so often. They gave her potion when they found out. We met secretly after that. But she died when I was eleven, died in childbed.
That's something they conveniently forget. Even with the help of the deleff, some women cannot go on having child after child just because the Council decrees it.'
Herra frowned. 'With women bearing so many children, I'm surprised Dsheresh Kashal is so small.'
'Many of them leave when they grow up - or even while they're still children. Life here is so uneventful.
They risk the dangers of the desert to find some excitement.'
Herra sighed and patted her arm gently. 'I think it's time for us to leave, too. How do I speak to the Elder SS'Habi again, Narla? How does one call them back?'
'Only Sarm can do that and he won't help you now.'
'He must! Sarm! Sarm, come here!' Herra clapped her hands and Sarm came out of his hut, moving with clumsy reluctance under her Compulsion. His expression betrayed his outrage at this, but however hard he tried, he was unable to disobey.
'Call the SS'Habi back, Sarm! Tell them I wish to speak to them again.'
Like a badly jointed puppet, he swung round and the two women followed him inside his hut. The two guards standing in one corner were dismissed with another snap of Herra's fingers. Sarm muttered something under his breath and took down a carved stone of a beautiful translucent blue. He set this on a stool in the centre of the room. His anger was still evident, even under the Compulsion.
' Call them! ' Herra repeated.
He sat down in front of the stone and gazed at it intently. Soon his eyes glazed over and his body sagged.
The stone began to give off blue flashes of light.
' Tell them I shall cause no violence, unless someone tries to force me to do something against my will.'
Dully Sarm repeated her words. A blue haze began to form around the stone, pulsating, as if alive. It grew bigger and spread out to capture Sarm, who grew as still as a bird hypnotised by a snake, then rolled over sideways, unconscious. As the mist lapped around the two women, Herra again gathered her forces and whispered a plea to her Brother. Narla gasped and collapsed helplessly on the ground. Herra could feel a coldness invading her mind, but she fought against it. For a moment it seemed as if everything went dark, then as the mist cleared, she found herself still on her feet, and the coldness receding.
She looked around in amazement. They were back in Dsheresh Vale and she’d felt no sense of transition.
Narla lay unconscious at her feet, but of Sarm there was no sign.
'Giver of Words not allow violence,' warned a voice Herra could now recognise quite easily as one of the two Senior SS'Habi.
From behind her came the voice of the Elder SS'Habi. 'Elder Ssisster grows sstronger. But musst not cause violence here. Musst not! Iss dangerous.'
'I didn't start the violence last time. I was merely protecting myself. I do not willingly tread the path of Discord any more than you do.'
'Why not take potion? It makes people happy.'
'It would not make me happy; it would have taken my will away and diminished my powers. I could not allow that. My God would not have wished that to happen.'
'Deleff not understand Brother-God. This one not understand, either. Iss very sstrange.'
'Would you understand it better if I called my God the goodness within me, the truth around me?'
'Understand truth, yes, but not goodness within.' One of the Elder SS'Habi's limbs reached out towards Herra, who stepped quickly back to avoid it.
'Will not hurt Elder Ssisster. Cannot use force in Dsheresh Vale. But need to undersstand. Need to touch.
Pleasse allow this.'
'Very well.' Herra grasped the end of the limb and moved closer to the SS'Habi. Another tip settled lightly a
cross her forehead, but no violence was offered to her. Instead, a series of pictures seemed to float before her eyes. She received a confused image of young spider-creatures, their fur grey, their eyes blank and uncomprehending, then a picture of the older ones, their fur tinged with yellow, their eyes bright with intelligence, and finally a picture of the Elder SS'Habi, proudly standing in the grove where the High Council of the Deleff lived - no, not lived, but thought and understood, digested ideas - why was 'lived' wrong? Why was communication with these creatures so difficult?
'Thiss one proud to serve deleff,' whispered a soft voice in her ear. 'Need to understand Elder Ssisster better for their sake. Elder Ssisster iss of interest to deleff. Has different skills to other humans. And knowledge. Much knowledge. Different knowledge. Humans in Dsheresh Kashal live quietly. No interest in knowledge. Elder Ssisster try to understand world, like deleff. Search for truth. Deleff must know truth. This one - proud to serve Giver of Words. Proud to search for truth.'
'We too are searching for truth. We call it our Quest for Wisdom,' Herra said. 'And that quest is the centre of my life. Is that really what the deleff are doing? Trying to understand the world? Searching for truth.'
'Sometimes. Idea iss close. Not quite same. Also try to understand selves. And build memories for other deleff to use in future transformations. Go travelling in Twelve Claims when young. Learn things. Bring knowledge back to Dsheresh Vale. Collect much knowledge. Sometimes must bring people back. Iss not good. Try not to. With people comes violence. Must stop violence! Build village for humans outside Dsheresh Vale. Help them be happy. Give them potion. Iss all can do.'
'Why not send them back home without memories of what happened? Surely the deleff could do that?'
'Could do this, but not to last. One day, memories come back. Then other people come here. Iss not good to allow many humans to come into these lands. Humans destroy peace. Stop careful thinking. Stop understanding. Not many deleff. Many humans. Iss too dangerous.'
'Why can I communicate with you better than with the deleff, Elder SS'Habi? Why did they not ask me questions through you before? It would have saved me much pain.'