Marion Zimmer Bradley's Sword and Sorceress XXII

by Cirone, Patricia B.

  "Silence!" Jir broke from Mirani's shadow. She stamped her foot, and the strands of glinting metal beads wound around her ankles clashed loudly. Such ornaments were few and precious, drawn from the rocks by an old magic that had died with Iri. Wearing them was an honor reserved alone for those who served the gods. "Tokal speaks with more wisdom than the rest of you will ever know. You think the gods are as short-lived and shallow-minded as you? They're deathless, not witless, and it takes wit to hear their words and read the signs they set before our eyes. Tokal has heard and seen clearly." She turned toward the young hunter and smiled.

  I know that look. To be an accomplished huntress meant more than being able to hit the mark. The difference between success and failure on the trail also lay in being able to read the subtlest signs. Anyone could follow a track of hoof prints in soft earth, but when the game chose a path over raw rock, only the true hunters could still find and follow it. Is that the answer, my sister? You want Tokal, I see it. But is that why you've gone against me?

  "What about you, Jir?" Mirani fixed her student with a piercing look. "How clear is your vision? I can guess what it's revealed to you: That your sister must lay down her bow and sit at the fireside with the other women." She spoke coldly, scorn clinging to every word. "What will satisfy your small heart? For our tribe to lose the most skilled hunter we've ever had?"

  In spite of the fire priestess' authority and support, murmurs of dissent came from the crowd:

  "Skilled? Tell that to my children's empty bellies!"

  "You worry too much about that monstrous girl and too little about the rest of us, Mirani!"

  "Maybe if we fed our fires with her bow and arrows, the gods would be pleased and feed us again!"

  This last idea was greeted with many strident cries of agreement. A trio of Tokal's fellow huntsmen exchanged conspiratorial looks and silently began to move towards Edra. She didn't wait to second-guess their intentions or try to stand against them. If anyone in the tribe had objected—even if they feared to do more than speak out against the men's obvious purpose—she would have held her ground. If the chieftain had spoken up, ordering them to keep their places, she might have lingered, but when he said nothing, his silence became a nod of approval. He'd let them wrest her father's bow away, crush it to a heap of splinters, yet keep his own hands clean.

  She sprang away before the men had taken three steps. She was a puff of dust in the firelight, a breeze flying far from the campsite, a ripple of shadows swallowed by the forest. Angry shouts faded in the distance behind her. She didn't bother to glance back to see if anyone was trying to run her down in the oncoming dark. She heard no footfalls, no branches snapping, no harsh breathing as the men tried to match her speed. That was how she understood her flight was unchallenged, that her people no longer cared enough about her fate to bother going after her.

  In a small clearing a fair distance away from the campsite, she sat down on a fallen tree trunk and pondered her situation. If I go back, they'll break my arrows and my bow. They might as well break me. If I don't return, I'll have to make my own way on the land. I could live well enough without any of them, but as things are, with the woods deserted...She rested her head in her hands wearily as the night settled over her. With the chill of darkness came the whispers of doubt.

  Maybe. . .maybe I'm wrong. Maybe the gods are against me for taking the path I've chosen. Have I sacrificed my people for the sake of my own desires? If that's so— She picked up her father's bow and looked at it sadly —if that's so, it's time I made a different sacrifice.

  Tears trickled down her cheeks as she unstrung the great weapon and held it at arm's length in both hands. Head bowed, knuckles white, she began to bend the silver-tipped wood in a way it could not bear for long. Her own sob stifled the bow's first faint groan of protest.

  Edra...Edra...

  The words caressed her mind, not her ears, a whisper that came from nowhere, everywhere at once. She jerked her head up and darted glances into the surrounding woodland. She had the bow restrung as swift as thought, and an arrow nocked to the string. "Who's there?"

  Child, don't you know me? Am I such a dreadful memory? Or have you changed so much since I've been gone? This isn't the girl I knew, the bold one, the fox-eyed little hunter who filled my old belly with meat and my old eyes with joy.

  Edra stood up, a wisp of apprehension shuddering over her bones as she recognized the voice. "Iri..." She breathed the dead shaman's name and the forest answered with an old man's laughter.

  Something moved through the moonlight against the background of trees. Edra followed it, or tried to do so. Though she had trained her eyes to see almost as well by night as by day, what she tracked now was no fixed shape, but an absence, seen and not-seen at once. Like morning mist when the sun's heat touches it, she thought, and suddenly she felt deathly cold.

  Don't be afraid, Edra. The voice came again, stronger. You did me no wrong in life. I mean you no harm.

  "I'm not afraid." The tip of her arrowhead swept slowly across the line of trees.

  Oho! Then why were you poised to cast away your other self? Great sacrifices come only from great fear. But you are as wrong to fear the gods as you are to fear me.

  "I fear neither you nor the gods, Iri," Edra said, her words soft-spoken but steady. "If I fear anything, it's for our people."

  Do you love them so much, Edra? The spirit's voice painted an image in Edra's mind of Iri's living face, the old shaman's bright eyes wide with mock disbelief. And how much do you think they love you? How much would they sacrifice for your sake?

  "I don't want them to sacrifice anything for me. If I was ready to give up my bow, it was of my own free will for them."

  For them? Iri's voice was amused, skeptical. All of them, Edra?

  She paused a moment, then shook her head. "No. Not for all of them. For the children. None of them blame me for the famine, yet they suffer for it. If breaking my bow will break their hunger, I'll do it in a heartbeat."

  Good, good. The best sacrifices, the true ones, the only ones that please the gods are those that come from whole and willing hearts.

  "The gods—" Edra snorted. "Our people say that the land is barren because of me, that soon even the fish will be gone, that the lakes and streams will go the way of the forest. They whisper that the gods have turned away from us because I am a woman and a hunter."

  The dead man chortled. You've hunted for more seasons than I can recall, and our people have eaten your kills greedily enough. Can any of our tribe explain why it took our gods so long to get angry about it?

  Edra's expression hardened. "You're turning this into a joke."

  More laughter sounded through her mind. You will have to forgive me, child. Death has been cruel to my body but kind to my sense of humor. It's hard to take the world seriously when one dwells beyond its reach. But in honesty, why would the gods wait so many seasons to show their displeasure?

  "That was your doing, your prayers keeping the gods' anger at bay."

  Was it? The dead shaman sounded surprised. I never suspected one person's prayer was better than another's. Die and learn.

  "Stop toying with me. While you lived, you spoke to the gods for us—all the gods except the fire goddess. Our next shaman would have done the same, but you didn't name him before you died. Nor after. Your son Tokal still waits for word that he's the chosen one."

  Does he? It isn't wise to keep someone waiting, god or mortal. Dead needles rattled on the pine branches. And if the gods are angry because I've named no one among you to serve them after me...Iri's voice trailed off.

  The young woman tensed. "Is—is that why you've come to me now?"

  Ah! Now I've frightened you!

  "I told you, I'm not afrai—"

  Now, now, no lies. My eyes may be dust, but I can still see clearly. You are afraid, Edra. You dread hearing that I've returned to name Tokal our shaman.

  "N-no." Her hold on bow and arrow didn't slacken, though her voice
faltered just a bit. "If that were so, I'd accept it. One shaman names the next. It's always been that way."

  And since when are you so ready to accept the way things have "always" been? Iri's spirit chuckled.

  Edra took a deep breath. "All right then: If you're here to name Tokal as your heir, why come to me? What good is a vision that doesn't appear to the one who must heed it?"

  What good indeed? The dead man's voice turned sad. What good are any visions while our people live under the wings of a curse? It flew here on the breath of rash words, and you were only moments from making the same mistake, throwing the gods' gift back in their faces.

  Edra's hands began to tingle. She looked at her father's bow and gasped as the arrow she held ready flared with a cold green flame but did not burn away. "The gods' gift," she whispered.

  That? A frigid wind knifed past Edra's face, capturing the arrow, green flame and all, in a thin shroud of ice. The gods' true gifts to you are greater than mere things, no matter how deeply touched by magic. What use is the bow without the arm to draw it? What use is hope without valor, or knowledge without the courage to embrace it?

  "And what use are riddles while our people starve?" Edra told the air. "Tell me how to use whatever gifts the gods have given me. Show me how to break the curse."

  The frosty wind swirled around the young huntress, sending twinkling stars of ice dancing along her bow. The frozen dart vanished. A second arrow made of ice and starlight floated in the air before Edra's eyes. Her free hand moved as if through the depths of the sea to close around it. The shimmering faded, leaving a pale core of bone in the huntress' grasp.

  Skel's arrow, Edra, the dead shaman said. The sacred dart made from the bones of a dead hero. You clasp a legend in your hand, and only a strong hand can master it. You will only have to tell it what you seek and it will find your quarry. You will not need to aim for it to fly unerringly to the target. It will not fail to kill.

  Edra laughed nervously. "It hunts, it finds, it aims, it strikes true. . .This arrow needs nothing from me!"

  The arrow needs the bow, the bow needs the hunter. Without your hand to draw back the bowstring, Skel's arrow is no more than a sliver of ancient bone. But what does the hunter need?

  "Not more riddles, I'll tell you that much." For the first time in too long, Edra found hope enough to smile. "Lead me, Iri. Lend me wisdom. Show me the first step on the trail I must follow."

  The wind rose, and the trees swayed. The branches overhanging the path leading back to her people's campsite parted at the touch of invisible hands, making her path clear. Edra's mouth went dry.

  What does the hunter need? Iri's voice repeated, fading on the wind. Only the heart to do what must be done.

  * * * *

  The people knew she had returned to them from an encounter with something more than human. She saw it in their faces the moment she stepped back into the circle of firelight, her bow in hand, the white fletching of Skel's arrow pricking her fingertips. Young mothers held their children close, pinch-cheeked toddlers and infants too hungry to cry. Strong-limbed men stepped aside to let her pass. The few elders, frail-boned, with skin as thin and fragile as dead leaves, murmured among themselves and made trembling hand-signs to ward off calamity. No one else spoke a word—not even the chieftain—until Mirani ventured forward and knelt at Edra's feet.

  "Mirani?" Edra scarcely recognized her own voice, echoing strangely in her ears. "What are you doing?"

  The fire priestess lifted her face. "You can't see yourself, Edra. You don't see what we do, or you would understand. Fires dance around you, bright and cold, soft as the down on a hatchling red-crest. And then, you bring us this." Her slender hands hovered reverently above the waiting arrow. "Something found you in the forest."

  Edra nodded. She told her people all that had happened since she'd fled them: Iri's spirit, his gift, her mission. As she spoke, she saw how her every word conjured fresh fear into her people's faces. No one could escape the news she brought: The curse would be lifted, but at a life's cost. A sacrifice must come.

  When she was done, the chieftain spoke: "A sacrifice...A sacrifice by one of Skel's own arrows. May the gods hear me, even though I am no shaman. May the gods receive my thanks for giving our people a fresh chance, even though one of us must— must—" He took a deep breath and let it out slowly as his eyes passed from one frightened, firelit face to the next. "Let it be done."

  Edra raised her bow. She felt the barbed tip of Skel's arrow vibrating, pulling at the bow, at her arms, at her entire body. It was seeking its quarry, choosing its rightful target. Her mouth filled with sour liquid as the arrow forced her to follow its slow, agonizing track from one person to the next. Every face held endlessly repeated cries of No, please, no, please, no, except for the young mothers. They hunched their shoulders, trying to hide their children's bodies with their own, while their eyes cried out Take my life, Edra! Take my life and spare his, spare hers, take mine!

  And then the pull of the arrow stopped.

  "Jir?" Horrified, Edra met her sister's eyes. It was astounding: There was no fear in them. The fire priestess' apprentice looked as though the arrow's choice were welcome. Certainly she did not look surprised.

  "Well hunted, sister," Jir said calmly. "Why do you hesitate? Give the gods what they demand. Give our people back the deer. Give old Iri's spirit a second chance to name his heir—a willing one, this time—after I am gone."

  Edra felt cold sweat mist her brow as the dead shaman's words came back: What good is a vision that doesn't appear to the one who must heed it? "Iri came to you, Jir? Goddess, when?"

  Her sister closed her eyes as though savoring a pleasant dream. "Two days after his burial. Tokal was...with me. At first he thought his father's spirit had come to bring him the news he was so hungry to hear." She cast a fond glance at the shaman's lastborn son. He looked half mad with grief. "Tokal, my love, don't weep," Jir said tenderly. "I've made my own doom. I brought the curse of hunger on our people the moment that I told your father's spirit I would never be our shaman. How could I? It's one thing to serve the fire goddess, as women have always done, but for a woman to be brazen enough to speak to the gods? Our people would never stand for it. I was sure they'd destroy me first. Bad enough we already had one woman who'd gone against the 'natural' way of things." She gave Edra a rueful smile. "I refused to believe that Iri's spirit brought me the true desires of the gods. I turned my back on them, and so they turned their backs on us."

  "It isn't fair!" Tokal cried out. "Everyone knows that only the fire goddess can be served by women. That's how it's always been! Jir shouldn't be punished for doing what we all know is right." He scowled ferociously at Edra. "If your arrow kills her, you'd better have a second one waiting to kill me."

  Edra saw Tokal's hand close around the hilt of his long knife. He took a step toward her, but before he could take another, Jir flew to his side and held his hands immobile.

  "No, beloved," she said quietly. "You mustn't interfere. I've brought enough misfortune to our people, enough humiliation to you." She looked at her sister. "After I refused the gods' call, I saw a way for me to wield a shaman's power without risk. If Tokal could be named his father's successor, he would pretend to walk the path between our people and the gods, but I would be the one to tread it for him. I sent him to woo you because we needed you to lie for us. Too many eyes saw how things were—are—between Tokal and me. Too many wouldn't believe it if I swore that Iri chose him."

  Jir turned wistful eyes to her people. "I clung to the old ways out of cowardice, not virtue. I have refused the gods' command, endangered us all, tried to manipulate my own sister and treated her harshly when she wouldn't bend to my plans. I wanted power without risk, and now I find that I've risked and lost everything." She kissed Tokal long and sweetly, then opened her arms to Edra and the silver-tipped bow.

  "I love you, my sister. Forgive me. Let the arrow fly."

  Edra drew back the bowstring. Skel's arrow w
hined in her ear, eager for release. She looked down the pale shaft to her sister's face. The lifeless woods surrounded her with their silence. All she had to do was set the arrow free and the curse would be lifted, the gods' anger sated, the deer would return, the hunger would be over.

  Set the arrow free, Edra, Iri's voice whispered from the snowy fletching. Set Skel's arrow free.

  Into my sister's heart? Her hands tightened in the bow. No. Things change, even the ways of gods and heroes. It's not Skel's arrow now. The gods' gift, yes, but in my hands. My father's bow, Skel's arrow, but my choice to rule how they'll be used. Mine.

  The silver-tipped bow cut the night air like an eagle's wing as Edra swept her aim skyward to the stars. Her shout was so loud that afterwards there were many to swear that the moon itself shook at the sound like a pebble-rippled pool. She released the bowstring, and the arrow soared into the heavens, a streak of white so blinding that the people shaded their eyes against brilliance almost too dazzling to bear. As they watched, transfixed, the arrow made from a hero's shattered bones shattered again into countless shards of light. They dropped swiftly, and the hunters cried out in happy astonishment as a fat, spirited stag sprang out of the earth wherever a gleaming fragment fell. The deer snorted and plunged into the trees, the hunters scrambling for their spears and bows and arrows as they raced off in pursuit.

  Her bow in hand, Edra took her weeping sister into her arms. And from the forest came the sound of drowsy birds, of little bright-eyed creatures, of the great herds' return, and of a spirit's slowly fading laughter.

  A Nose for Trouble

  by Patricia B. Cirone

  Patricia B. Cirone has been writing for a number of years, and has sold more than a dozen short stories, some of which were published by Marion Zimmer Bradley. One of her greatest joys is that she got to meet Marion several times and talk to her about writing, life, and writing some more. In her day job as a librarian, she spends more time talking about books than reading or writing them, but she is currently working on a novel which she hopes to finish before the characters in it get so frustrated they stop talking to her. She lives in New England with her husband, two cats, and a fencing foil that is a lot easier to maneuver in stories than in real life.