Starfire Saga, page 41
I said good night with only half my attention. The rest, feeble as it was at that point, was directed to something that had finally surfaced fully and demanded I heed it.
Something was going on between Jemeret and Coney—something whose depths I had sensed, but couldn’t fathom. It had to do with the ease with which Coney had accepted and adapted to this world, and the familiarity I sensed in the relationship between them. It made me wonder where it came from, and it shook the very foundations of the trust Jemeret had earned from me, because I sensed very strongly that neither of them wanted me to raise the question. I didn’t want to doubt; it seemed I had little choice but to be what this life had led me to be. And I did love them both.
And yet there was something suspicious going on, and I wanted to know what it was.
I held the uneasiness to me like a subterfuge, and if Jemeret sensed it—which I think he must have—he neither mentioned it nor let it affect his smile as the last of them left and Numima hurried in to begin to clear up.
“Come to bed,” my lord said to me.
I turned toward the bedroom, knowing I’d never last through a bath. I almost let myself doze as I was walking in, and he sat me on the bed, stripped me, and rolled me into the blankets.
“Do you want to see if the High Lady makes love like the simple bracelet did?” I murmured, partly asleep.
“You were never a simple bracelet,” he said, laughing. “I’m going to see to the guards.” I was asleep before he finished talking, and I deeped immediately.
I thought, in the morning, when he woke me early, that I felt so very safe in this room. Of course, I would recognize that just as we were leaving, for who knew how long.
Two things happened on our trip to the Forge which increased my unease, but I still fought to keep from yielding to doubts. Both were things I overheard by accident.
I had learned to isolate my thoughts from the outside world—from Jemeret—by building a figurative bubble around myself. It was something it had never occurred to me to do in the Com, when only Jasin Lebec could have read me and when I was convinced that there was no possible way my Class A reflex could be cut off from the rest of me. Now, of course, I knew that there was a myriad of things I never suspected, and I’d begun to experiment. I’d discovered that unlike shielding, in which I still had a presence that could be detected, I could surround myself with a bubble of nothing, just as Jemeret used his ability to catch my projections and trap them.
I don’t think I did it deliberately, to be able to approach him without his knowing it, but self-deception has always been one of my preoccupations. I have to admit that the bubble did—does—allow me to make myself transparent to my lord. It also consumes an inordinate amount of energy. It helped me to begin imagining the power Jemeret had expended trapping my projection during the game of the Dibel.
At any rate, after we camped in the forest on the third night of our journey, I had been taking care of the tivongs, since I was the one of us with the most in-depth experience of the animals. I was grateful that no one seemed inclined to stop me from doing it simply because the starfire had anointed my brow-crown with some still unknown destiny.
I was coming out of the relatively sheltered glade in which I’d picketed the animals. They needed shelter more than we did, because it was impossible for us to carry enough fodder for them. That meant they would have to eat the low-hanging branches, especially those of the conifers, which kept their hard, needlelike leaves even in the worst of the cold. I’d scattered the small sacks of treated, dried grain we could carry, which would make certain the animals didn’t suffer any nutrient losses, and they were busily eating that first. The grain had the additional benefit of making it easier for them to digest the normally harsh wild provender. While I was spreading the grain, Tynnanna, who had accompanied us on this journey without the slightest hesitation, had switched his tail at me several times and bolted off into the forest to hunt.
When I saw that the tivongs were all settled down securely, I walked quietly out of the trees toward the little group of lean-tos we’d set up around the roaring fire. Gundever and Wendagash were gathering snow in empty feed sacks so that it could be melted over the fire for the tivongs to drink. Venacrona was crouched by the blaze, turning a spit with skinned laba carcasses on it, and the three other warriors we’d brought with us were scouting the perimeter, a precaution Jemeret took even though he and I had both probed over the surrounding area for a distance of several miles and felt no other presences. Jemeret and Coney had been gathering firewood, but now they sat on a log near the lean-to Coney would occupy with another of the warriors, talking in low voices.
I couldn’t resist. I swept the sting around me into a protective bubble and augmented my hearing in time to hear Coney say seriously, “...come with us when we go?”
“Absolutely.” Jemeret’s voice held no hesitation. “Even if I hadn’t given her my word, I worked too damned hard to risk her.”
Venacrona saw me and rose, which drew my lord’s attention first to him, then to me.
As he glanced in my direction, I let the bubble drop away and went to join them. Neither Jemeret nor Coney referred to whatever they’d been discussing.
The second time, two days later, I’d taken advantage of one of the short stops along the trail to relieve myself, and I was hidden by a boulder, my hearing augmented so that I could tell if anyone was approaching, when I heard Venacrona ask Jemeret, “How much are you going to tell Sabaran?”
“As little as I can,” Jemeret answered. “He’ll need to know enough to ensure his full cooperation, but he and I have played that game for years, and there’s never been any trouble. I don’t anticipate any now.”
“And Ashkalin?” Venacrona’s voice was slightly more doubtful.
“Ashkalin will ultimately have to know everything. We need his cooperation too much.”
“What if it falls apart?” Venacrona’s words were so low, so tense, that I felt he must have wanted to ask the question for a long time.
“I’m not about to let it fall apart, Veen,” Jemeret said instantly. “No matter what it costs me. She—” He stopped abruptly. “Ronica?”
I pulled up my leggings and stepped out from behind the boulder, thinking that this time I would have to confront the situation, and still somehow reluctant to do so. “I’m here,” I said, as if he had summoned me. “Are you concerned that the tribes might not accept me as High Lady?”
He nearly smiled, which I felt was an inappropriate reaction. “To a minor extent—very minor—yes, I am,” he said, “but I think there will be ways to deal with reluctance. In any case, we’ll know more tomorrow. The Paj should all have let Sabaran know who intends what and who will be coming to meet us where. I’ll be able to make some choices after that.”
I was reading him, and it was true, but this was not what he was worried about. This was a small thing, despite all previous evidence to the contrary. He was seriously concerned about something else, and under the concern, as I’d seen it so clearly when I probed him, was the anger, the knot of dark rage whose object I had not come to know at all.
We studied one another for a few moments. He might have been waiting to see if I would ask more, but my sense of him was that he hoped I would not. I was curious, but I understood that some revelations were not pleasant ones, and I gave a small shrug and let him have his way.
That night, lying curled against his chest under our lean-to canvas, I had to will myself to sleep, and I dreamed again of the sparkly golden veil that hung between me and the indistinct figures that moved on the other side of it, closer now, but still unseeable.
Sabaran, Clematis, and Sheridar came to the mouth of the low valley to greet us. Behind them I could see the longhouses that sheltered the Genda in their home territory. The slopes of the hills on which the houses perched also showed the neatly shored and braced entrances to the caves that this tribe used as storehouses, stables, and wagon sheds. Jemeret had told me that the major forge buildings themselves would be out of sight behind the tumbled piles of boulders to the left side of the valley, while the longhouses I could see in the distance to the right were those of the Dibel. He had also told me that the Elden Homestead was several kilometers to the south, behind the hills and out of sight.
Clematis embraced me warmly, her eyes sliding over the dancing colors in the brow-crown without her seeming to be at all inhibited by it. To my amazement, I was deeply relieved. In the Com, I’d welcomed the distance between myself and the “ordinary” people. It had been an indication of my uniqueness, my singular worth. Now, I feared that distance. Jemeret had been very successful at teaching me that I was indeed a unique human being, but so was everyone else, in different ways. I had begun to learn that I could find my worth in the interaction between myself and others, and I already knew that I needed that interaction; I didn’t want it to vanish because the starfire had chosen me for purposes whose scope I hadn’t yet seen. Very little I had ever done in the Com had rewarded me personally as much as the things I’d been able to do here, where I had been welcomed even when I was maimed, and loved for reasons I couldn’t understand but was learning to accept.
Jemeret and Sabaran had clasped arms, and the big blond man said immediately, “The Genda will be overjoyed to stand with the Boru in this.” Then, the formality over, he gave a hearty laugh. “When the messenger arrived, my bracelet shouted so loudly the Dibel thought she was auditioning.” Clematis swatted his shoulder, blushing.
“Will Lyrafi and Orion be joining us here, or do they want us to come to them?” Jemeret asked.
“Sandalari says they’ll be here immediately after the storm. Their priest signaled that they have a death in the tribe and they need to complete the ceremonies.” Sabaran bowed his head to Venacrona as he spoke.
I looked at the distant longhouses and automatically reached out, seeing what I could feel. “Do you know who died?” I asked the Lord of the Genda.
Clematis’s expression softened apologetically. “We didn’t inquire,” she said. “Generally, a death is a tribal thing, and we let the Dibel live separate from us, even though we can see one another’s homes and we share the same farms.”
I nodded, unrebuked, but still wanting to know if it had been Tendoro who died. He had seemed so old, and yet like most creative artists, his energy, the generative power of creativity, could have masked even greater age. And I felt I owed him something, for he had built the nomidar that gave me such joy.
Then I realized, with a start, that no one I had ever cared about had died. I’d killed people—Drenalion, Evesti of the Ilto—but I had not mourned for them. I had never had to mourn for someone who was gone. My body began to tremble.
Jemeret was at my side instantly, his conversation with Sheridar broken off in mid-word, his hands on my shoulders. “Tell me,” he said.
It took me a moment to find the words. “Something happened. Something—struck the things I can’t remember—and it hurt.” I looked at him almost helplessly, letting the anger and frustration wash over me and depart. “Why can’t I remember?”
“You will.” He barely whispered it, his lips on my forehead below the brow-crown. “Let’s get the tribes together and get you declared. That’s what we have to worry about now.”
He must have been calming me, because I calmed, and I didn’t analyze where it came from. Everyone around us had gone quiet.
Jemeret looked up at the Gendal chief. I sensed the motion over my head. “I’m going to take Ronica to the Dibel for an hour or so,” he said evenly. “We’ll be back in advance of the storm. Veen, will you take care of getting us settled?”
“Of course.”
“I’ll stop them from unsaddling your mounts,” said Sheridar.
I made myself look up at Clematis, amazed to note that she was slightly hazed with tears. “Your prospective High Lady is not perfect,” I said a little shakily, trying to muster up a laugh.
Her face was warm, affectionate. “We never thought she would be perfect,” she said, “because she would be human. We always knew she would have an uphill climb. I suppose the surprise is that we just didn’t know we would witness any of it.” She pulled me into her arms and held me tightly, even though Jemeret had not let go of my shoulders.
He allowed her to hold me briefly, then tightened his grip and drew me away. “We need to go if we’re to outpace the storm getting back.”
We galloped Vrand and Rocky from one set of longhouses to the other, Tynnanna racing along beside us. The longhouses were just that—houses that rambled over a hundred meters of ground each, but were only two or three rooms wide. Each housed twenty or more families who shared a central kitchen, hearth, and hall. Venacrona had told me that smaller sheds attached to the backs of each longhouse held some individual supplies. I didn’t pick out the central temple, but he had said it would be small, for only the Boru temple was a multistory structure.
Jemeret watched me, letting Vrand choose his own path. Sometimes I wondered at the unusual degree of his preoccupation with me. At the beginning, I’d been resentful of the centrality I held for him, seeing it as an indication of his possessiveness. When he’d poured reserves into me, saving my life, and later, as I began to comprehend the true extent of his almost unbelievable power, I became flattered by the attention. I was almost surprised when, now, I became embarrassed by it. His love I treasured, but his constant attention made me wonder if he were somehow unsure of me—and yet, he had probed me, and he knew he had nothing to be unsure of. What was it I still didn’t know?
Despite having probed him and seen everything there was to see, I still had the notion that he had some purpose I could not grasp—which, I guessed now, involved Coney. The question was whether it had anything to do with what I couldn’t remember. And if so, how?
Two years was a long time.
I felt the surge of Jemeret’s energy as he signaled the Dibel that we were approaching, and as we drew up to the first of the longhouses, a woman in a beautifully beaded coat came out to meet us, smiling a little seriously, as if glad to see us but aware of the solemnity of the occasion. It was, I noted with surprise, Ginestra of the Paj.
Jemeret was also surprised. He swung down off Vrand and put his arm around his fellow chief. “I didn’t expect to find you here,” he said.
She kissed his cheek and nodded respectfully in my direction as I dismounted. “I thought it would save time if I came myself, instead of sending one of the messengers. I brought Rudenil to serve as Councillor with me. You know, I’m sure, that our priest told us at Midwinter Song that the Fulfillment was at hand.” She smiled at me, a little more completely. “We wanted this to come fully as long and as much as you do.” Jemeret cocked his head at her. “Well,” she added, “perhaps not as much.”
“Who else agrees with you?” He spoke the question casually, but he was tense.
Ginestra stepped back from him. “Everyone here at the Forge, and the Hall, you know. Henion is on his way here as well. Ustivet isn’t happy, and so far he hasn’t shown any signs of leaving the Lodge.” Her eyes darkened a little. “And we’ve had no word at all from the other side of Reglessa Fen.”
“Where is the funeral?” I asked her, interrupting as politely as I could. I was unwilling to simply scan for it, since I saw no one in the complex except the three of us, and there was something about the occasion which demanded a respect for privacy.
Ginestra pointed up the hill behind the sprawling longhouses. “At the very top, to the east,” she said.
Without waiting to see if Jemeret wanted to follow me, I ran in the direction she’d indicated, scanning ahead now that I knew where to look and could therefore keep the scan very subtle. Despite the lightness of my touch, the strength of the sadness, the mourning I encountered, nearly made me stumble. And then, beneath that surface, just as I’d felt it beneath the layers of fear in the hospital room on Werd, I encountered the incredible, pure love. I’d been looking for it for such a long time. And now, when I finally found it, I was aware instantly that it was so much less than Jemeret gave me that I was humiliated to have idealized it for so long. I’d have laughed if it hadn’t been entirely inappropriate.
The Dibeli cemetery was a large clearing in the trees that crowned the hill, filled with elaborately carved monuments very different from the stone cairns of the Boru. The monuments were not representations of the people who’d been laid in the ground beneath them, but of the artistry of those people. The Dibel believed it was right to remember people for what they left behind, and in art was their immortality.
I slowed to a walk, and several of the people in the crowd around the grave looked up. There were probably fewer than 250 people in the cemetery, a low number for a tribe, but I remembered that dozens of the players and musicians would be at other tribes or among the Honish, entertaining them. Dirian must have been one of them, for I did not see him among the people present.
The crowd nearest me parted, and at the graveside itself I saw Lyrafi and her brother. Then, beyond them, much to my relief, I saw the bent, fragile figure of Tendoro. He had just looked around, sensing a disturbance that rippled through the crowd like the wind heralding the approach of the storm. Tynnanna stalked at my side, tall enough now so that his shoulder was nearly on a level with mine, and therefore even more formidable than he had been the last time any of them saw him.
Lyrafi stepped away from the mourners and came to me, clasping my hands and touching her cheek to mine. “You are always welcome among us,” she said. “Karaghida told us you would be coming.” I had never met the Dibeli priest. “Excuse me,” the Chief of the Dibel went on. “We have to finish singing Parto away.” The two-syllable name told me it was a child who had died.
I stood at the edge of the crowd with my klawit as Lyrafi went back to the graveside, where the older priest in the four-colored robe raised his arms. The tribe began to sing.
The song would have been marvelous for the nomidar, for it had three distinct melodic strains, each of which was countered by a harmony. The Dibel sang it flawlessly, its complexities eased by long usage and unfortunate familiarity. As its richness washed over me, I walked around the outside of the crowd until I was near Tendoro.
