The Light of Life

by Edward W. Robertson

  "Glad to see not everyone has lost their minds," One nodded at Four. "Now then, Three, you got any history lessons about all the outlanders we've taken in over the years? Because I just did a quick count and came out with…let me see here…" He lowered his head, counting off on his fingers. "Oh right. Zero."

  "You're right," Ara said. "No hari has ever been trained in the Odo Sein. As far as I know, they've never even been allowed to set foot in the Spires. I'm as interested as you are to hear the foreigners explain to us why we should break that streak."

  "It's just as I've said." Dante kept close watch on the faces of the undecideds: Two, Ara, Four, and Six. "We're the only ones who can stop your enemy from conquering you—and the rest of us in turn. Why wouldn't you train us?"

  One got a good laugh from this. "You're warlocks, right? Great big powerful ones. Except when you oppose the Odo Sein, of course, when we render you just another man with a sword. Back in your frigid homelands, if your enemies came to you, would you teach them the ways of your dark magic?"

  "That depends. Is my homeland being ripped apart by an invincible lich who I'm powerless to stop?"

  "If we're so powerless, why are you begging us for aid?"

  "Now who's getting off track? Yes, I would train my enemies if that's what it took to hold off the enemy that would destroy us both. What other choice would I have?"

  "An easy answer to give. Now let's think this through. You and your enemy have always run at a stalemate. Maybe you're the big guy one year, and the next year his kingdom's looking a little stronger, but neither one of you has been able to conquer the other. You're evenly matched. Now they come to you and you teach them all of your strengths. Together, you march against the new foe. And you beat him! Wow! Great job."

  One leaned back in his chair, looking down his long nose. "Then you go home. Soon enough, the old conflicts flare back up. Only this time, you're not evenly matched anymore. You've taught your enemy everything you know. And they use it to put you to the sword."

  "That's paranoia. We're not your enemies. Until a few months ago, I didn't even know you people existed."

  The bulky man exchanged a smug look with Five. She smacked a meaty hand on the arm of her chair. "You ask us for the one skill that is uniquely Tanarian. The one weapon we know how to forge that no one else does. You say that you're not our enemy? Perhaps not. Perhaps not for now." She pointed to Gladdic. "But his people surely hate us, and if they ever cast off the Drakebane, they will come for their revenge. Or the Alebolgians will buy the secret from the Mallish, and send their greedy ships to plunder our wealth from Aris Osis, reducing us to poverty. Your claims that you are not the enemy are disingenuous. When you pour a bottle of spirits into the swamp, there's no putting it back in the bottle. If we allow our secrets to leave Tanar Atain, one day, they will be used against us."

  "You might be right," Dante said, keeping his words slow to mask his annoyance. "But I still say it doesn't matter. Not when the alternative is your total destruction at the hands of the lich."

  "The wisdom of the Odo Sein lies at the core of who we are as Tanarians." This was spoken by Two, a man in his fifties with the lean-limbed build of one of the runners the Galladese used to swiftly deliver messages across the rugged terrain of the rift valleys. "If we pass it along to foreigners, and it's no longer our own, then haven't we lost who we are?"

  "How so? You'd still be right here."

  "You fail to look deeply enough. If the process of saving ourselves requires us to destroy who we are, then what have we saved?"

  "Aside from the world?"

  "Joke all you want," One said. "You're not the one being asked to surrender all of Narashtovik's treasures to outsiders."

  "I just don't see how sharing a piece of Tanar Atain can destroy Tanar Atain. If anything, it will spread your influence and your prestige." Dante rested his arm on the pommel of his sword, then blinked. He reached for the handle, the gently tapered horn of a swamp dragon, and drew the blade. Purple nether forked along the black metal.

  One shot to his feet and thrust his finger at Dante. "That's one of our swords!"

  "Right and wrong." Dante held up the weapon for them to see. "It's modeled after your weapons. But I crafted it myself. Your design has saved me several times already, allowing me to find my way to the Spires, where we will find a way to kill your mad wizard. Meanwhile, though I've borrowed from their traditions, the Odo Sein still exist, completely untroubled by my 'theft.' And the same will be true if you teach us to be one of them."

  He held the sword up another few moments. Each Voice stared at the swirling nether, which continued to flow even as every other shadow lay trapped by their power. Dante let the moment linger, then sheathed the blade with a forceful click. He allowed himself a small smile.

  One chortled. Ara sighed. Seven cleared his throat, then looked down, a touch of red coming to his cheeks.

  "Rhetoric," Ara said. "You're trying to stir our guts. But has it occurred to you that sword you carry is the physical embodiment of what we profess to fear?"

  Dante shook his head. Sensing his bewilderment, Blays stepped up beside him, giving the audience a small bow. "Forgive me for making a suggestion that's almost stupidly simple. But what if we just promise not to tell anyone else what you teach us?"

  Five laughed some more, her belly shaking. "And no man has ever lied? No foreigner has ever broken a promise to people he has no loyalty to? No, hari, we can't accept your word as if it's made from pure gold."

  "The main problem here is that we're not Tanarians, right? Then how about if we solve that whole mess by becoming Tanarians?"

  This caused the Voices to exchange glances. Frowning at his lap, Seven said, "That would be an elegant solution, yes."

  "But?"

  "But," One said, "you aren't Tanarians. Look at yourselves. Your features are as fat as a blowfish."

  "The fish aren't going to like it when that gets back to them. Surely you don't think the way a person looks determines what land they belong to. If we'd been born in Dara Bode, and raised as right and proper Tanarians, would you still think we were nasty hari?"

  "A convincing counter," Five said. "But irrelevant, as you weren't born in our land, nor raised as one of us."

  One's face bent with contempt. "It's not that convincing. If you jump in the water and swim for an hour, does that make you a fish?"

  "Mostly, it makes me hungry and sleepy," Blays said. "I daresay that fishiness isn't defined by the specific piece of water the fish lives in. You can take a fish from one pond and put it into another and it'll do just fine in its new home."

  Six eyed them, the wrinkles deepening around his eyes. "You'd become Tanarian, would you? What can you tell me about the Body?"

  "The body? It's fleshy? Some bones inside to keep it from flopping around? An excellent way to travel from one place to another without the need for expensive horses or canoes?"

  "I refer to the Body of Tanar Atain."

  "Yes, me too. As I was saying, something about how you're all a part of it. And you have…duties. To the rest of it. All pulling together, you might say. Just as a body's lungs, heart, spleen, and so forth set aside their differences and work together to keep the physical body, ah…alive, and happy, and so forth, so must the people of Tanar Atain work together to form what you might call a Body of the country."

  Seven was looking embarrassed again. Six applied one of the most patient expressions Dante had ever seen. "You aren't Tanarians. You could live among us for another dozen years and you might not yet be one of us. Do you suppose the Eiden Rane will give us that long to find out?"

  "Maybe if we got him something to distract him. Like a large quantity of pinwheels."

  "This is all hypothetical, isn't it?" Ara motioned to Dante. "Would you actually pledge to serve Tanar Atain when it means you'd have to sever all your ties to your homeland? You'd renounce your titles and pledge to serve as knights in the Drakebane's service?"

  Dante shifted on
his feet. "I have a responsibility to my people. I can't abandon them."

  "Then you can't become Odo Sein."

  "We could make it—"

  She made a cutting motion through the air. "This will never work. You can't be a master of one land and a servant to another."

  Blays shrugged at Dante. "Well damn, that trick worked with the Broken Herons."

  "I have a solution." This came from Gladdic, who drew a thin, hooked knife and set it against his throat. "Once our work is finished, I will destroy myself, and my knowledge of the Odo Sein will perish with me."

  "Finally, we're getting somewhere." One grinned at Dante and Blays. "And the two of you? Would you make such a pledge?"

  "Absolutely," Blays said. "To be honest, I've been looking for an excuse to off myself ever since I found out my favorite baker closed shop."

  Dante gazed across the seven waiting faces. "Do you realize how easy it would be to lie to you? We could complete our training, slay the Eiden Rane, then return to our homeland, and you wouldn't be able to do anything to stop it. You're trapped here. So yes, I too promise to commit suicide once our mission is complete."

  Ara pressed her knuckle to her upper lip. "For some reason, I feel as if I can't trust you on this one."

  One tilted his head toward her. "I'm not hearing bold ideals. I'm not hearing a compelling counter-morality for us to explore. All I'm hearing is ways for them to weasel past our beliefs. Are we ready to vote?"

  Several of the others nodded. From the bored and exasperated looks on their faces, Dante could tell which way the vote would swing.

  "Stop," he said, and found he had nothing else.

  One regarded him with heavy-lidded eyes. "Why?"

  "Because you're about to vote no."

  "That's the first time you've been right during this entire Argument. Voices, let's get this done with. Everyone who is convinced that the Silent Spires should train hari in the way of the Odo Sein?"

  No hands went up. After two seconds, Seven lifted his arm, though he didn't look happy about it. No one joined him.

  Gladdic laughed, a sour and caustic thing. "Look at these wise elders who condemn themselves to death."

  One smirked. "The time for talking is over, priest. We've made our decision."

  "It must have been easier to reach that decision knowing that soon, no one will be alive to write the history of your cowardice."

  "Enough. Guards, he might look old, but that'll only make him easier to drag away."

  Soldiers moved in from the sides. Blays' hands drifted toward the scabbards on his hips.

  Dante laughed. "You won't train us because you fear it would lead to the loss of Tanar Atain. But what does it matter when you've already let that happen? Your culture's in its death throes. Train us in the Odo Sein, and I'll save it from vanishing forever."

  The soldiers paused, waiting for orders. One swore. "I told you, no more talk. The Voices have spoken."

  Ara stood, drifting a step toward Dante. Her eyes seemed to grow sharper while the rest of her face blurred. "We should listen. I see inspiration in him, One. Don't you?"

  The large man glared at her in disgust, then considered Dante. His anger relaxed. For the first time, doubt crept across his face. "Damn it. Shit and scales, I see it. Speak, priest. And be fast with it."

  "The idea is very simple," Dante said. "The execution will be complicated. You need to put your language into writing. You need to put your ideas and your history into books. And I will help you."

  Six started to speak, then coughed, his elderly eyes watering. A servant leaned in to help him only to be smacked away by the old man.

  After a gulp of air, Six found his voice. "You know nothing of Tanar Atain. You think we've never heard of writing before? Of books? We have our reasons for doing things as we do."

  "I understand perfectly well. What is it you once said about this, Volo? That Tanarians want their truths written in water, which naturally changes its form to suit its surroundings, rather than chiseled in stone, which can never be altered?"

  "Close enough," Volo mumbled, wide-eyed and clearly reluctant to be dragged into the talk.

  "Congratulations," Six said. "You listened to one thing that one of us had to say. We have no need for your writing. It's stifling. We've passed our knowledge along just fine without it."

  Dante took a step to his right, looking past the towers in the direction of the distant swamps. "That worked before, when everyone thought the same way that you do about the value of being able to exchange ideas with anyone willing to listen. But once a group breaks away from that, and clamps down on what can be said, they'll destroy anything they don't like. You're seeing it now with the Righteous Monsoon. They believe they have all the answers, that there's no need to pursue other ideas—that any others are a threat to them. As a result, they've already banned dana kide. Put an end to your daily quest for new truths. Soon, they'll be imprisoning or killing the heretics who deny their faith, if they haven't started already. Even if we kill the lich, the Monsoon will kill everything you consider Tanarian, until your former culture is as barren as these hills."

  All seven Voices watched him thoughtfully. He raced onward, letting the idea Gladdic had provoked in him unfold. "The only way to protect your heritage is to write it down. So that if you're killed, your ideas and knowledge won't die with you. So that other Tanarians don't have to come to you to find your wisdom, but can share your books as easily as they'd share a meal. Books can be burned, or wear out with time, but in most ways, they're stronger than us. They never get too tired to go on. They don't need to eat. They can be hidden away for years without harm. This is how you last in the face of strife."

  Dante returned to the center of the shrine's floor and faced Ara. "As I said, the idea's a simple one, but getting it done will be as complex as any sorcery. Here's my offer. If you train us in the Odo Sein, then I will bring Narashtovik's scholars to you. They'll train your own scholars and archivists. They'll show you how to craft an alphabet. To record yourselves on parchment. To fill libraries with the story of Tanar Atain. That way, you can persist through the Monsoon without losing your past to the flames. So that even when the day comes that Tanar Atain eases into the past, its history will remain alive forever."

  Five stirred, jowls creased with a frown. "Are you finished?"

  Dante folded his hands at his waist. "I think we're all hoping the answer to that is a massive yes."

  "Then I call for a final vote on the matter of whether to teach the hari the skills of the Odo Sein. All those in favor?"

  Still meeting Dante's eyes, Five raised her right hand. Dante swung back his head in surprise. Seven was next to follow, and then the others, until only One remained with his hand down.

  "Six to one," Five declared. "The Argument is concluded. The Voices have spoken. Ara, you are hereby authorized to train the four before us in the ways of the Odo Sein."

  8

  "Are you ready?" Ara waited until each of them had nodded their affirmation. "Then you may begin your practice."

  "Right." Blays shifted his knees on the mats Ara had laid out at the edge of the forest, the bleakness of the Hills spread before them. He looked down, adjusted his jabat, then took a sharp breath through his nose. "Pardon my comically deep foreigner's ignorance, but did I miss the part where we were taught what to do?"

  "No, I shouldn't think so."

  "That's odd. Because I'm pretty sure you just told us to get to it. But what is it?"

  "It is the Odo Sein," Ara said.

  "I've managed to pick up on that much. But aren't you going to, er, teach us?"

  "How should I do that?"

  Blays looked at Dante. "A little help?"

  "Oh no." On the mat beside him, Dante shook his head vigorously. "I think you've got the matter well in hand."

  "I'll admit I'm not much of a teacher myself. Unless you'd like to learn how to chug a mug of beer without spilling down your shirt. But it seems to me that you might try t
eaching us the same way you taught your other students."

  Ara touched her finger to her lips. "Interesting. Are you my other students?"

  "If so, I must have delivered a few too many chugging lessons, because I don't remember any of it."

  "If you aren't those other students, then how can I teach you the same way I taught them?"

  "With terrific skill and aplomb?"

  "It's critical to the understanding of the Odo Sein that the student learns its processes on their own."

  "Why is that?" Dante said.

  She fixed her eyes on his. "Think. Why might that be?"

  "You're a radically isolated group of practitioners of an obscure form of sorcery. The most likely answer is because you're loony mystics who've spent too much time cut off from human contact, and have either gone insane, or adopted unique practices that are indistinguishable from insanity. But I'm guessing that's not what you're going for?"

  "Why are you framing that as a joke when it's a perfectly reasonable conclusion?"

  "Am I right?"

  "You'd better hope not, hadn't you?"

  Dante leaned on one palm. "If learning the processes on your own is vital to the process itself, that suggests the Odo Sein is based on private revelation."

  "Or the very process you're engaged in right now," Gladdic said.

  "Reasoning? Deduction? Getting mired down in silly arguments? This is sorcery, not philosophy."

  "Both the nether and ether follow predictable rules. One might even say that they are logical."

  "Oh yes, they're practically arithmetic. You remember that time I added two to three and it killed twenty Monsoon soldiers?"

  "You're not very smart," Ara said to Blays.

  He laughed. "We've only met today, and yet it's already like you've known me forever."

  "A minute ago, you told me you don't know anything about the Odo Sein. But you're wrong about that. And not only a little bit wrong, but so wrong that I have a hard time believing you're not deliberately lying."