The Price of Wisdom

by Shannah Jay

  Katia drew her away from the pool. 'The deleff seem to be the ones who decide who shall go where in their portals. They obviously felt you should come here, to the High Alder. And you're very welcome, Soo, believe me.' It must be hard for Soo to be so far from home, in a world so different from her own.

  There was a shout of joy from behind her and Mak, who’d been coming to see if Katia needed any help, rushed forward to clasp Soo in his arms and cover her face with kisses.

  Katia stepped back and gestured to Lerna. 'Mak is her husband. They've been separated for quite a while. Let's leave them to enjoy their reunion.'

  As they walked along, people greeted them and shouted a welcome to the newcomer.

  'It seems strange to see people so healthy and happy,' Lerna murmured.

  As the older woman stumbled, Katia put an arm round her shoulders, ignoring the dampness of her clothes. 'We'll soon get all of you looking just as healthy, don't worry.' She hid her own regret that Davred hadn’t returned to her and concentrated on helping the newcomers. Dry clothes and food first, then a Healing Circle, she decided. That before anything else, for Lerna at least, and for those with the coughing sickness that miners used to get long ago in poorly-ventilated mines, and which several of these people were suffering from. Before the Serpent seized control, the Sister Healers had been able to prevent that so easily and mines had been run with more thought for those working in them.

  Afterwards, they would have to rearrange the accommodation and provide the newcomers with rest and plenty of good nourishing food for a while until they’d fully recovered. Cheral would be in her element doing that.

  Smiling, Katia took Lerna to find towels and dry clothes, then over to the table, where she helped her pile a plate with food. Then she kept busy for the rest of the day. After the evening Gathering, she formed a Healing Circle, and they healed those in need. It was a most joyful occasion, with love flowing around them all.

  Afterwards she and her grandfather took Erlic for a long walk, ostensibly to gather the nuts that were still to be found here and there, but actually just to walk in the forests she loved so much and teach her son forest lore. When she was there among the trees, it helped ease the pain of Davred's absence. Well, it helped a little.

  Not until most people were in bed did Katia try to contact Davred. The mind link between them was very weak tonight, which could mean he was somewhere where the Serpent was strong. Soo had said that Davred and Herra were going back to Setherak to look for Petur. Setherak was the very centre of the Serpent cult, the place where it had first started. Herra thought Sen-Sether's ancestors must have founded it, for some dark purposes of their own.

  Katia sighed in relief as she made contact. Well, at least Davred was safe. She could always sense that.

  After she’d let the tenuous thread of communication with Davred fade, it was still a long time before Katia could sleep. She could have used a Minor Discipline to make herself drowsy, but at times she preferred to lie awake and think. Sometimes you had to review your actions, check that you were doing the right thing, get your thoughts in order.

  Since she’d shifted the cliff face to cut off Greygulf Pass and keep Those of the Serpent at bay, she’d hardly had time to think. It was wonderful to be reunited with Kensin. Her grandfather had reared her when her parents died, and reared her well, too. Now, she was watching with pleasure as he spent time with Erlic, the strange son the deleff had planted in her womb. Erlic had taken to his grandfather at once, which was rare for Erlic, who was a very aloof sort of person with everyone except his parents, his twin and those who’d travelled with him.

  The settlement became quiet as people slept. Northwoods was growing rapidly as refugees from the Twelve Claims poured in. Some of them stayed on in town and some moved further into the High Alder. The ironworkers rescued by Benjan were among the latter. They’d found themselves a lode of iron and moved to live near it. They kept complaining they weren’t used to doing the mining as well, so they’d be delighted to see these new arrivals.

  At the core of Northwoods were the people who’d lived in her old home town, Danak, now in the hands of the Serpent. They’d brought many skills to help the Kindred's cause, but first they were making sure everyone was protected against the winter, which was now coming down upon them rapidly. They were building houses and shelters and storehouses more rapidly than people would once have believed possible. No embellishments, no carving, not a joint or a piece of wood that wasn't necessary, just buildings as strong as human hands could make them. Bare and ugly inside, by Aldrani standards, but decoration would have to wait. Furniture, apart from tables, rough benches and beds, could also wait until all were safe from the coming snow and frost. Winter was short, but at times harsh in the High Alder.

  Those who weren't building were out garnering any chance harvest of nuts or late fruit they could find, or digging up edible tubers to put in store. Some groups went out to hunt the wild rock nerids, trying not to kill too many in one area. The meat could be dried or salted for later use. Others went further afield to find smaller game like water birds on the various lakes and bring them back to smoke and store.

  The biggest problem was finding enough salt. Two days after the miners arrived, Kensin led out an exploration team to hunt for it in a region he thought might contain some natural deposits. When they came back nearly empty-handed, deleff walked out of the portal, and took some people and wagons back through it to a seaside settlement which specialised in salt-making. Jonner went with that group, since he was a trader.

  While he was there, Jonner stole a few moments from his brisk bargaining for salt to walk down to the ocean. He’d always like the sea-shore. A sudden wave rolled in to drench him before he could escape and he thought he heard an echo of laughter behind it. There's something out there, he thought.

  Definitely something out there. The elders of the village said it was the sea-god Feera, who lived in the Hollow Islands and kept Those of the Serpent at bay. Well, if he was against the Serpent, this Feera must be all right, as far as Jonner was concerned.

  'Those devils daren't crew the boats themselves,' the headman added, with a grin, 'because Feera

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  doesn't like them and their ways. Nor they don't dare try to make us go into the shrines any more. Folk who follow the Serpent seem to encounter nothing but storms on the ocean nowadays and they come back with their boats half empty.'

  'So you've got yourselves a little relief from them sods?' Jonner queried.

  'A little. They still fine us, though. And they still try to take our daughters. I sent my girls to live along the coast with their aunt, and when they're older, they're going out to that new settlement in the islands. They'll be safe enough there. Only us fisherfolk can get through Feera's Gut.' He paused and looked puzzled. 'Where did you say you'd come from? I haven't heard any news of traders coming this way.'

  Jonner tapped his nose. 'Special trip. Came through the wildwoods mostly. Got some new settlements out beyond the Twelve Claims who need salt. If we come again, can you have some ready for us?'

  'We can. There are whole caves of it along the coast. But I don't see how you can make a profit carrying salt. It takes up a lot of room and doesn't bring much profit. And beside, a new settlement usually lives off the land. How can they pay for it?'

  Jonner looked around. 'Well, I'll tell you, because you're a headman and because I can sense that you don't like those wrigglers. We've got a lot of refugees out there, fleeing from the Serpent. Silver and jewels aren't much use to them, but salt is.'

  The headman looked disapproving. 'So you're taking advantage of them to cheat them out of their possessions?'

  "No, 'course not. Word of a trader. I don't need to cheat, just turn a fair profit. I could ask much more, but I don't. Think the deleff would stay with me if I traded unfairly? No, me and them folk have just come to a mutual agreement about what's fair an' I've set up routes to take the salt back. They're real h
appy with what I'm doing, I promise you. An' the deleff are helping.' That at least was true.

  The headman stared at him for a moment. 'All right. I can sense you're not lying about your trading being fair.' He lowered his voice. 'I was chosen as an Elder in the old days, an' I can tell when folk are lying to me.' He raised his voice again. 'We'll start bagging up some extra salt, then. Come for it whenever you like. But keep to the wildwoods and don't let Those of the Serpent see you. I don't want the fines increasing, which they will if those wrigglers think we're making more money than before.'

  'So you see,' Jonner told the Council of Elders at Northwoods when he got back, 'Those of the Serpent aren't having it all their own way on the coast.'

  That thought made everyone feel happier.

  ***

  Quinna's twins would be born in the middle of the winter. Benjan was the father, and he was taking a great interest in them, but he was no longer living with her. Now that Carryn had grown up and got over her brutal ravishment in the shrine at Tenebrak, she’d begun to return his love as a woman, not a child. He’d spoken to Quinna privately when he and Carryn arrived in the High Alder, offering to wait to marry Carryn until after the twins were born, so that he could look after Quinna.

  'Brother, look down!' Quinna had exclaimed, slapping one meaty fist against her thigh. 'Don't you think I'm capable of looking after myself?'

  'It's harder when you're pregnant, and I owe you a lot, Quin. And as a friend, I still love you deeply.'

  'Hah! Well, thank you very much, but I've no intention of hanging around when you're lusting for another woman. I can manage perfectly well without you.'

  'Are you sure?'

  She nodded, her voice unusually soft. 'Of course I'm sure, you great lump! I'll call on you if I need help, though, I promise.'

  So Benjan and Carryn cried aloud their marriage in the meeting house, as was the age-old custom of the Sisterhood, and then Cheral led the dancing line along the streets of the new settlement. Quinna held her head high and joined in. She was the first to congratulate the pair of them. She knew she'd miss old Ben, but she hadn't grown up thinking you could have all you wanted in this life, so that was that.

  A little later, Quinna astonished everyone by moving in to live with Kensin.

  Only to Katia did she explain herself. 'He's as strong as a draft nerid, your grandfather is, for all he's nearly eighty.' Quinna's voice dropped as she added, 'And he understands what it is to be lonely.'

  Katia nodded. 'I knew he’d be lonely when I was chosen. He doesn't like living in towns. Even now he's built his new hut out in the forest away from the rest of us.'

  'Well, I'm not much of a one for towns, either. Though I'm still not used to this forest of yours.

  Anyone could creep up on you through all that greenery without you realising it. I made Kensin cut back all the plants around his hut before I moved in.'

  'No one will creep up on you with Nim keeping watch.'

  'Better safe then have your throat cut while you're asleep.' Quinna scuffed her toe in the soft earth.

  'You - er - don't mind Nim living with us, do you? I mean, it was you who first befriended her.'

  'No, of course I don't mind. I don't have the time to keep her company as she deserves. You do.

  And,' Katia smiled, 'I'm sure you'll let me visit you both occasionally?'

  Quinna nodded and gave Katia a sudden, rib-cracking hug, then, ashamed of this display of emotion, changed the subject again. 'I really like your grandfather. He doesn't bother me with empty gibble-gabble. And he's teaching me some forest lore. It's not like the Sandrims, but I'm getting used to it. He says if he's spared, he'll help me rear the children - if I can't get back to the Sandrims, that is. And we thought we might take in some other children, too - there are a lot of orphans around. We could organise them in a squad like we did on the Sandrims. What do you think?'

  'I think that's an excellent idea.'

  Quinna started fiddling with her sword hilt as she added, 'You're a Healer. You will keep an eye on Kensin, won't you?'

  Katia chuckled. 'I would if it were needed, but he's extremely fit. I think he has the Gift of Longevity.'

  Quinna's face brightened.

  Katia gave Quinna a gentler hug than she’d received. 'I think it's an excellent idea and if you two decide to get married, I'll lead the wedding line for you myself.'

  But that was going too far for Quinna. 'I don't believe in this marriage stuff. We never needed it on the Sandrims and I don't need words and - and fuss to keep me true to a mate here.'

  Katia smiled every time she remembered this conversation. Quinna and her grandfather were the

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  best of friends already, and they had six youngsters living with them now, youngsters who’d suffered greatly in the Discord Wars. All of them adored Quinna and their only disobediences to the strict rules she and Kensin imposed were when they tried to spare her any heavy lifting as her pregnancy progressed.

  And then, Katia mused, during another restless night, there was Evren, son of Benner, Lord Claimant of Tenebron. It was amazing that a man of evil should raise a son impervious to that evil, a son who’d supported the Sisterhood and their gentle ways long before they managed to help him escape from his father. She liked Evren. Carryn liked him, too, for all his father had been the first one to ravish her. Lerina was Evren's half-sister, and the two of them were very close, since neither had any other siblings.

  Aderon seemed a promising lad, too, the son of the murdered Lord Claimant of Dyandra. Young as he was, Aderon had vowed solemnly that one day he would regain his position as Lord Claimant of Dyandra, and no one, seeing the determination on his narrow young face, could doubt that he meant what he said.

  'Brother, look down upon him!' Katia murmured on the thought. So many people with so many wrongs to right.

  ***

  Cheral, once Novice Mistress at Temple Tenebrak, was in her element at Northwoods. She was organising the practicalities of everyday living, as she always had done, and helping train the young ones, for it had been decided that all youngsters should receive 'temple training', as ordinary folk called it, whether chosen to join the Kindred or not. Anything which would make people stronger, more resistant to the Serpent, more able to fight back, was important. Not that all the youngsters relished the lessons, with Cheral's sharp tongue prodding them on to push themselves to the furthest limits of their capabilities, but you did what you had to in times like these, and even the youngsters understood that.

  Whatever they did, though, here in Northwoods, it would be a hard winter with so many mouths to feed, but they would manage somehow. The survivors of the Discord Wars were toughened by all they’d endured.

  Jonner had been fretting for other reasons, until the salt question arose. He was a trader to his core and didn't like to stay long in one place. There was nothing he could do in Northwoods that someone else couldn't do just as well. The occasional trip to purchase salt was helping, but it wasn’t enough for a man like him, who liked to use his wit and experience to a profitable end.

  He was now talking about starting a trading circuit among the outlying settlements, but he couldn't do that until some deleff came to draw his wagon. And so far they hadn't. They'd only appeared now and then to take the wagons through the portal to the salt-makers, seeming to know without telling when they were needed.

  Jonner and Narla had delayed crying aloud their marriage for a while. Like Quinna, Narla said she didn't need to be married. In Dsheresh Kashal, where she had been born, temporary marriages had been decided annually by the council, and Narla had already had six children. But strangely, it was Jonner who wanted to be formally married, and in the end he had his way. Perhaps it was the joy of Benjan and Carryn's marriage that wore down Narla's resistance. Anyway, Jonner had his special day and enjoyed every minute of it to the full.

  They needed such celebrations after the traumas they had been through. And if the plates at
wedding feasts weren’t piled as high as in the old days, well, the singing and dancing were just as loud and exuberant.

  Katia in particular cherished the warm memory of Jonner and Narla's wedding day. One night she was smiling over it in the darkness when her expression suddenly became serious. She’d been puzzling for a while about what she should do next. Now, as she stared out of the window of her new home at the single full moon that was sailing across the night sky, the God suddenly seemed to whisper in her ear.

  She sat bolt upright in her bed. That was it! They would start to train people for the struggle that lay ahead. Really train them. Every single one of them must learn how to fight. Quinna and Benjan could organise that training better than anyone, but others would play their part. Kensin could share his woodcraft skills, for they didn’t have enough people for an outright confrontation, and any who fought against Those of the Serpent, or kept watch upon them, must slip in and out of hiding, strike quickly and leave just as quickly.

  She knew the people of northern Dyandra would help them. In fact, they could, if they moved slowly and carefully, set up a whole chain of rebellious settlements across the north of the Twelve Claims, linked by common need, though the sort of people who founded new settlements were usually ferociously independent. But now they’d have to make sure that every single person in these settlements was trained to fight and resist Those of the Serpent. If the deleff would help with the portals and if Jonner would continue to pretend to be on a trading round, they could send information from one settlement to another in a way Those of the Serpent could never match.

  Joy filled her, replacing the earlier sadness for Davred. How she’d changed, how the girl reluctant even to become a novice in the Sisterhood, was now a Sister through and through! She who had always loathed violence must start people training to fight until Herra and Davred returned.