Earthborn

by Orson Scott Card

  "Nafai was a hero," said an old man. "The Keeper says nothing to us."

  "The Keeper spoke to Binaro," said Ilihiak mildly.

  "Binadi," muttered another man.

  Khideo shook his head. "The Keeper also sent the dream that brought Monush to us. We will trust that after we have done all we can do, the Keeper must do the rest to keep us safe. But my plan does not require us to pray to the Keeper and then hope our prayer is granted. You all know that we are forbidden to ferment any of our barley, even though it makes the water safer from disease. Why is that?"

  "Because the beer makes the diggers crazy," said an old man.

  "It makes them stupid," said Khideo. "It makes them drunk. Rowdy, noisy, happy, stupid-and then they pass out. This is why we're forbidden to make it-because the dirt-eaters don't have any self-control."

  "If we offer them beer," said Ilihiak, "even presuming we can find any-"

  Several of the men laughed. Apparently clandestine brewing was not unheard of.

  "-what's to stop them from arresting and imprisoning whoever offers it to them?"

  Khideo only nodded at the king.

  No, not at the king at all. At the king's wife, Wissedwa. She turned her face away, so she didn't look directly at any of the men, but she spoke boldly so all could hear her. "We know that to the diggers all women are sacred. Even if they refuse the beer they will not lay hands on us. So we will offer it to them as the last share of the harvest. They'll know they can't legally turn it in to their superiors without also turning in the criminals who gave it to them; they'll have no choice but to drink it."

  "The queen speaks my plan from her own lips," said Khideo.

  Monush thought that Khideo bore the shame of deferring to a woman in council with great dignity. He would have to ask, later, why the voice of the woman was heard. In the meantime, though, it was obvious that she was no fool and had followed the discussion completely. Monush tried to imagine a woman at one of Motiak's councils. Who would it be? Not Dudagu, that was certain-had she ever uttered an intelligent word? And Toeledwa, before she died, had always been quiet, refusing even to ask about matters outside the rearing of her children and the affairs of the king's house. But Edhadeya, now- Monush could imagine her speaking boldly in council. There'd be no silencing her if once she was given the right to speak. This was definitely an idea that should never be suggested to Motiak. He doted on Edhadeya enough that he might just decide to grant her the privilege of speech, and that would be the end of all dignity for the king's council. I have not the humility of this Khideo, thought Monush.

  "Now we must know," said Khideo, "whether Monush knows another way back to Darakemba that won't take us through the heart of the land of Nafai."

  Monush spoke immediately. "Motiak and I looked at all the maps before my men and I set out. We had no choice but to come up the Tsidorek in search of you, because that was the route of your great king Zenifab when your ancestors left. But for the return, if you know the way to the river Mebberek-"

  "It's called Mebbereg in this country," said an old man, "if it's the same river."

  "Does it have a tributary with a pure source?" asked Monush.

  "Mebbereg's largest tributary is the Ureg. It begins in a lake called Uprod, which is a pure source," said the old man.

  "That's the one," said Monush. "There's an ancient pass above Uprod leading into the land northward. I know how to find it, I think, if the land hasn't changed too much since our maps were made. It comes out not far from a bend in the Padurek, which is the great pure-source tributary of the Tsidorek. From the moment we emerge from that pass, we will be in lands ruled by Motiak."

  Khideo nodded. "Then we will leave through the back of the city, away from the river. And we'll only need to give the beer to the Elemaki guards who are stationed here in the city. The guards downriver and upriver will never hear us, nor will the ones crossriver know anything is going on. And when the guards discover us gone, they won't dare go to their king to report their failure, because they know that they'll all be slaughtered. Instead they'll flee into the forest themselves and become outlaws and vagabonds, and it will be many days before the king of the Elemaki knows what we've done. That is my plan, O king, and now I return your voice to you."

  "I receive back my voice," said Ilihiak. "And I declare that it truly was my voice, and Khideo is now my hands and my feet in leading this nation to freedom. He will set the day, and all will obey him as if he were king until we are at the shores of the Mebbereg."

  Monush watched as all the other men in the council immediately knelt and touched their palms to the floor, doing obeisance to Khideo. Monush nodded toward him, as befitted the dignity of the emissary of Motiak. Khideo looked at him under a raised eyebrow. Monush didn't let his benign expression waver. After a moment, Khideo must have decided that Monush's nod was enough, for he raised his hands to release the others, and then knelt himself before the king, putting his face between the king's knees and his hands flat on the king's feet.

  "All I do in your name will bring you honor, O king, until the day I give you back your hands and feet."

  Monush found it interesting that these rituals could have emerged so quickly, after only three generations of separation from Darakemba. Then it dawned on him that these rituals might be much older-but they had been learned from the Elemaki in the years since the Zenifi came to this place. How ironic if the Zenifi came here to be the purest Nafari, only to be the ones who adapted themselves to the ways of the Elemaki.

  Ilihiak laid his hands on Khideo's head for a moment. That apparently ended the ritual, and Khideo arose and returned to his seat. Ilihiak smiled at them all. "Act with courage, my friends, for the time is now if the Keeper is to deliver us at all."

  By evening, to Monush's astonishment, all the people had been notified, the allotted herds had been assembled, and the guards stationed in the city were roaring drunk. Hours before dawn, in bright moonlight, the people moved with astonishing quietness out of the city, past the stupefied diggers, out into the forest. Khideo and his scouts were excellent guides, and in three days they were at the shores of the Mebbereg. From there, Ilihiak, once again the sole ruler of the Zenifi, used Monush's services as a scout and guide-but Monush did not ask for, nor did Ilihiak offer, the kind of authority that had been given to Khideo.

  When I get to Motiak, thought Monush, I will tell him that he would be wise to give great respect to these people, for even in their small, oppressed kingdom, they found a few who are worthy of authority and skilled in its use.

  Edhadeya watched anxiously from her place among the women as the Zenifi passed through the river, coming out of it as new people. She saw how they shied away from the watching sky people; it made her feel sad to see how, even cleansed by the water of Tsidorek, they still kept the old prejudices they were raised with. We can wash people in the water all we want, she thought, but we can never wash their parents out of their hearts.

  She was not watching for real change in these people, of course- she knew that rituals existed to point the way, not to actually accomplish anything in themselves. They provided a marking point in people's lives, a public memory. Someday the children or grandchildren of the Zenifi would say, On the day our ancestors passed through the water they emerged as new people, and from that day forward we welcomed the sky people as our brothers, fellow children of the Keeper of Earth. But the truth would be very different, for in all likelihood it would be those very children or grandchildren who were the first of the Zenifi to embrace the brotherhood of angel and human. Yet their parents would not all deny what their children believed-the ritual was the marker, and in the end, it would become the truth even if it didn't begin that way.

  The women-even the waterkeepers-did not greet the people rising out of the icy water; it was the priests of Motiak who met them and laid hands on them to make them new people and give them names which were, oddly enough, identical to their old names with the addition of the title "citizen." Edhadeya wa
s old enough now to have learned the stories of the old days, when Luet stood as Nafai's equal, as Chveya and Oykib stood side by side. She was also old enough to have heard the priests talk about how the old records were misinterpreted, for it was the custom among the ancients to show so much honor to the Heroes that even their wives were treated like Heroes-but it was entirely because of their husbands that these women were remembered. Edhadeya read several passages from the Book of Nafai aloud to Uss-Uss, her digger teacher-slave. "How can the priests interpret this any way but that Luet was a waterseer before she even met Nafai? And Hushidh was a raveler long before she married Issib?"

  To which Uss-Uss replied, "Why should it surprise you that these male humans have to lie even about their own sacred records? The earth people honor their women; so do the sky people; therefore the middle people must deny their women."

  It seemed to Edhadeya at the time to be too simple an explanation, and now, watching the priests, she realized that most human men did not treat their wives and daughters as if they were nothing. Hadn't Father sent the expedition to find the Zenifi solely because of her own dream, the dream of a woman? That must have made the priests' skin crawl! And now every single man and woman who came out of the water was proof that the Keeper showed a woman what she never showed any of these priests!

  But it was not to gloat or boast that Edhadeya stood pressed to the rail of the bridge to watch the Zenifi become citizens. She was looking for the faces she had seen in her dream. Surely that family would be one of the people who came. But when the last of them passed through the water, Edhadeya knew that she hadn't seen them.

  How tragic, that the people she dreamed of should have been among the ones who died.

  It was not until hours later, after the presentations of this dignitary and that one to Father, that Edhadeya was able to get a moment with Monush-though certainly not a private moment, since Aronha and Mon both stayed as near the great soldier as they could get without wearing his clothing.

  "Monush," she said, "how sad that they died, the people I saw in my dream."

  "Died?" he asked. "No one died. We came away from Zinom without losing a single one of the people of Ilihiak."

  "But Monush, how can you explain to me why the people I dreamed of are not among these people?"

  Monush looked confused. "Perhaps you remember them wrong."

  Edhadeya shook her head. "Do you think I see such a vision every day? It was a true dream-and the people I truly saw aren't among these."

  Within a few minutes, Edhadeya was alone with Father, Monush, and two men of the Zenifi-their king, Ilihiak, and Khideo, who seemed to be Ilihiak's most honored friend.

  "Tell me of the people you saw," said Ilihiak kindly, when Motiak had indicated he should speak.

  Edhadeya described them, and Ilihiak and Khideo both nodded. "We know who it was she saw," said Ilihiak. "It was Akmaro and his wife Chebeya."

  "Who are they?" asked Motiak.

  Once again Ilihiak explained about the one priest who had opposed the killing of Binadi, how he had fled the kingdom and gathered a few hundred supporters before disappearing to escape the army Nuak sent against them. "If you dreamed of them," said Ilihiak, "and it was a true dream, it must mean that they are still alive. I rejoice to hear this."

  "But then that means we rescued the wrong people," said Monush. Ilihiak bowed his head. "My lord Motiak, I hope that you do not regret having redeemed my poor kingdom from captivity." Motiak stared silently into the empty air in front of him. "Motiak," said Monush, "I remember now that there was a brief time on the ledge of the cliff, before we passed near Sidonod, when I was confused. I had dreamed something but couldn't remember the dream. Now I realize that the Keeper must have been trying to show me the right way, and the mischievous Jaguar must have-"

  "No Jaguar," said Motiak. "The Jaguar has no power over the Keeper of Earth."

  "But over such a weak man as myself," said Monush. "There is no Jaguar except the stupid cats themselves," said Motiak impatiently. "I don't understand how you missed the right way, Monush. But I do know it was a good thing to find the Zenifi and bring them home to Darakemba. It was also a good thing for them to take the covenant and give up their old hatred of the sky people. The Keeper must be happy with this, so I refuse to call this a mistake."

  Motiak turned his gaze to Edhadeya. "Are you sure you interpreted your dream correctly? Perhaps this Akmaro was asking the Keeper to send help for the people of Ilihiak."

  "He and his wife and their children were frightened because of their own captivity," said Edhadeya.

  "But a girl can hardly interpret a true dream," said Khideo, sounding as if he were only pointing out the obvious.

  "You were not asked to speak," said Motiak mildly, "and my daughter is like my ancient mother-of-mothers, Luet-when she dreams true, she can be trusted. I hope you don't doubt that, my friend."

  Khideo bowed his head. "I have spent many years listening to a woman speak in a king's council," he said quietly. "She was the woman who saved the lives of our people, by leading our young girls out to plead with the invading Elemaki, knowing that the diggers among them would not raise their weapons against a female, but uncertain of what the bloodthirsty humans among them might do. But even she did not dare to interpret dreams in the council. And she was not a child."

  Motiak looked at him in silence, at his bowed head. "I see that you're ashamed of the way I conduct my council," said Motiak. "But if I had not heeded this girl's dream, my friend, Monush would never have been sent, and you would never have been brought here to freedom and safety."

  Ilihiak, obviously embarrassed, said, "It was never an easy thing for Khideo to break from the old ways, even to hear my wife speak in council, though she was very circumspect. But there has been no braver war leader nor truer friend-"

  "I'm not angry at Khideo," said Motiak. "I only ask him to understand that I do not shame him, I honor him by letting him be present when I hear my daughter's words. If he feels himself unprepared for this honor, he may withdraw and I will not be offended."

  "I beg to be allowed to stay," murmured Khideo.

  "Very well," said Motiak. Then he turned to the whole group. "We sent one expedition, and Monush tells me that it was very dangerous- they could have been discovered at any time."

  Edhadeya, sensing where this discussion was leading, plunged in. "But they weren't discovered," she said, "because the Keeper was protecting them and-"

  Father's cold stare and the shocked silence of the other men, their eyes wide, their mouths open-it was enough to silence her even as she pleaded for the people of the dream.

  "Perhaps my daughter could study the ancient stories, and learn that Luet showed proper respect at all times."

  Edhadeya had read the ancient stories already, many times, and she distinctly remembered that there were at least a few occasions when Luet showed that she thought her visions were more important than any kind of courtesy. But it would not be wise to contradict Father. She had already said too much-after all, most of the men here thought it improper for her even to be present at a council of the King. "Father, I should have confined my pleadings to a time when we are alone."

  "There is nothing to plead," said Motiak. "I obeyed the Keeper's dream and sent Monush and his men. They found the Zenifi and brought them home, and it seems plain to me that they had the protection of the Keeper all the way. Now if the Keeper wants me to send another expedition, he must first send another dream."

  "To a man this time, perhaps," said Khideo softly.

  Motiak smiled wanly. "I don't presume to tell the Keeper of Earth which of his children's minds should be the receptacle for his messages to us."

  Lesser men might have withered; Khideo managed to bow his head without seeming to give way at all. It seemed to Edhadeya that he might not always be content to bow to other men.

  "Edhadeya, you may leave us," said Father. "Trust in the Keeper of Earth. And also trust in me."

  Trust in Fath
er? Of course she did-she trusted in him to be kind to her, to keep his word, to be a just king and a wise father. But she could also trust him to ignore her most of the time, to allow custom to keep her in the women's part of the house where she was supposed to give respect to a jealous witling like Dudagu Dermo. If all women were like Edhadeya's stepmother, the customs would make sense- why should men have to waste time listening to her? But I am nothing like Dudagu, thought Edhadeya, and Father knows it. He knows it, and yet out of respect for custom he treats me as if all women were equally worthless. He gives custom more respect than he gives me.

  As she worked angrily on her pointless weaving in her room, Edhadeya had to be honest enough with herself to admit that Father treated her with more respect than she ever saw other men treat women-and that Father was criticized for it, too. Now that Monush had come home with the Zenifi, who really did need saving, everyone admitted that Motiak had not been foolish to listen to his daughter. But then, in front of everyone, Edhadeya had insisted that Monush brought back the wrong people. It was a stupid thing for her to do. Why spoil a triumph? There would have been chances to talk to him privately. She just wasn't used to thinking politically, that was all.

  But it was hardly her fault if she didn't understand about politics, was it? It wasn't her decision to keep her out of court except on women's days, when she was trotted out for display, to smile at the simpering ladies who drifted in like down from a baby duck. She wanted to scream at them that they were the most worthless creatures on earth, dressed in their fine clothing and never deigning to dirty their hands with work. Be like the sky women! Be like the earth women! Accomplish something! Be like the poorest of the middle women, if you can't think of anything else to do-learn a skill that isn't just decorative, have a thought of your own and sustain it with an argument!

  Be fair, be fair, she told herself. Many of these women are smarter than they seem. They learn their light manners and display their beauty to help increase their family's status and honor in the kingdom. What are they supposed to do? They aren't the daughter of an indulgent king who lets his daughter strut around as if she were a boy, standing on the roof with that mad child Mon who wants to be an angel... .