Changer’s Moon

I. The Janja’s Player’s Move

Kingfisher

Hern woke disoriented; coming out of dreams not quite harrowing enough for nightmare. He reached out for Serroi, not wanting to wake her but needing to be sure she hadn’t evaporated as had his dream. His hand moved over cold sheets, a dented pillow. He jerked up, looked wildly around, the not-quite-fear of the not-quite-nightmare squeezing his gut.

She was curled up on the padded ledge of the window Coyote had melted through the stone for her comfort, moonlight and starlight soft on the russet hair that had a tarnished pewter sheen in the color-denying light. Relief washed over him, then anger at her for frightening him, then mockery at his dependence on her. He sat watching her, speculating about what it was that drove her night after night to stare out at stars that never saw the mijloc. What was she thinking of? He felt a second flash of anger because he thought he knew, then a painful helplessness because there was nothing he could do to spare her-or himself-that distress. Not so long ago he’d shared dreams with her and learned in deep nonverbal ways the painful convolutions of her relationship with Ser Noris. Love and hate, fear and pleasure-the Noris had branded himself deep in her soul. If he could have managed it, he’d have strangled the creature. Not a man, not in the many senses of that word. Creature.

He got out of the bed and went to her, touched her shoulder, drew his finger down along the side of her face. “Worried?”

She tilted her head back to look up at him. For a moment she said nothing and he thought she wasn’t going to answer him. Then she did, with brutal honesty. “No. Thinking, Dom. Thinking that this is the last time we’ll be together.”

He wrapped his arms about her. Her small hands came up and closed warm over his wrists. “You aren’t coming back with us?” He heard no sign in his voice of the effort he’d taken to speak so calmly.

“That’s not what I meant,” she said. “I meant whole to each other, one to one, with everything, everyone else left outside the circle.”

“I see. The last time until this is over.”

She said nothing. He felt her stiffen against him, then relax, knew she had no belief in any afterwards even if they both survived. And he knew with flat finality that there was no place for her in his life as long as he continued Domnor of Oras and Cimpia plain. And knew, too, that each passing day made going back to that pomp more distasteful to him-that shuttered, blinded life where no one and nothing was real, where the courtiers all wore masks, faces pasted on top of faces that were no more real than masks. Like peeling the layers off an onion: when you got down to the last, there was nothing there. He looked over her head at the scatter of moons. He had to see his folk and the mijloc clear of this, but that was all he owed them. I’m tired, he thought, they’ve got enough years out of me. He shifted so he could slide his hands along her shoulders, moving them up her neck to play with her earlobes, back down again, flesh moving on flesh with a burring whisper. “There will be an afterwards for us,” he murmured. “If you’ll come with me, vixen. The world has another half to it, one neither of us has seen. You heal, I’ll heave, and we’ll end up as wizened little wanderers telling stories to unbelieving folk of the marvels we have seen, the marvels we have done.”

She moved her head across his ribs, sighed. “That feels good.”

He dropped a hand to cup her breast, moved his thumb slowly across her nipple, felt it harden. “Can’t you see us, me a fat old man with a fringe of mouse-colored hair, feet up on a table-I’ve forgotten all my manners, you see, gone senile with too much wine, too many years. Where was I, oh yes, feet up on the table, boasting of my sword fights and magic wars fought so long ago that everyone’s forgotten them. And you, little dainty creature, bowed by years, smiling at that old man and refraining from reminding him how much more necessary to the winning of those wars you were.” He slid his arm under her knees, scooped her up and carried her back to the bed.

Serroi woke with Hern’s arm flung across her, his head heavy on her shoulder. The window was letting in rosy light, dawn well into its display. She lay a few minutes, not wanting to disturb him. He had enough to face this day. Coyote was growing increasingly impatient because Hern hadn’t yet selected any of the mirror’s offerings. Today would be the last-he hadn’t said so, but she was sure of that. Today Hern had to find his weapon, the weapon that would someday turn in his hand and destroy him, if what Yael-mri hinted at was true. Or destroy what he was trying to protect. The Changer. Ser Noris feared for her, but she discounted that, not because she thought he’d lied but because his passion was for sameness not change; he wanted things about him clear-edged and immutable. At the peak of his power, any change could only mean loss. She sighed, eased away from Hern. His body was a furnace. Her leg started to itch. She ignored it awhile but the prickles grew rapidly more insistent. Carefully she lifted his arm and laid it along his side. For a moment her hands lingered on his arm, then she slid them up his broad back. She liked touching him, liked the feel of the muscles, now lightly blanketed with fat, liked the feel of the bone coming through the muscles. She combed her fingers very gently through his hair, the gray streaks shining in the black. Long. Too long. You ought to let me cut it a little. Clean and soft, it curled over her wrist as if it were a hand holding her.

The itch escalated to unendurable. She sat up, eased the quilts off her and scratched her leg. She sighed with pleasure as the itch subsided, glanced anxiously at Hern, but he was breathing slowly, steadily, still deep asleep. She smiled at him, affection warm in her.

The light was brightening outside with a silence strange to her. All her life she’d seen the dawn come in with birdsong, animal barks and hoots, assorted scrapes and rustles, never with this morning’s silence as if what the window showed wasn’t really there. Magic mirror. She smiled, remembering the mirror Ser Noris made for her that brought images from everywhere into her tower room anywhere, anything she wanted to see it showed her, tiny images she never was sure were real, even later when she’d seen many of those places and peoples with her own eyes, heard them, smelled them, eaten their food, watched their lives. I wonder if that is how Ser Noris sees all of us, pieces in a game, sterile sanitary images that have shapes and textures, but no intruding inconvenient smells and noises. Not quite real. No one quite real. No, I’m wrong. I was real for him awhile. Cluttering, demanding, all edges some days, all curves another. Maybe that’s why he wants me back-to remind him that he’s real too. He wants the touch he remembers, the questions, the tugs that pulled us together, yet reminded each that the other was still other. He doesn’t want me as I am now, only the Serroi he lost. And he doesn’t even know that the Serroi he wants never quite existed, was a construct out of his clever head.

She sighed, looked down at Hern and wanted to wrap herself about him so tight he couldn’t ever leave her, but she knew far better than he how little possibility for realization there was in those dreams he’d described to her. She smoothed her hand over his shoulder. He muttered a few drowsy sounds of pleasure, but did not wake, though his hand groped toward her, found her thigh and closed over it. Ah, she thought, I won’t say any more to you about that. I won’t say don’t count on me, love, I might not be around. “I’m a weakness you can’t afford, Dom Hern,” she whispered.

As if in answer to that his hand tightened on her thigh; he still slept but he held onto her so hard, there’d be bruises in her flesh when he woke. His hands were very strong. Short, broad man who’d never be thin, who was already regaining his comfortable rotundity with rest and Coyote’s food. She laid her hand over the one that was bruising her and felt the punishing grip loosen. Deceptive little man, far stronger and fit than he looks. Fast, stubborn, even quicker in mind than he was in body. Tired little fat man, gray hair, guileless face, bland stupid look when he wanted to put it on. She stroked the back of his hand and heard him sigh in his sleep, felt the grip loosen more. A snare and a delusion you are, my love. Mijloc didn’t appreciate you when they had you, won’t appreciate you when they get you back. She eased the hand off her thigh and set it on the sheet beside him. He didn’t wake but grew restless, turned over, his arm crooking across his eyes as if the brightening light bothered him, then he settled again into deep slow breathing, almost a snore. She slipped off the bed, kicked the discarded sleeping shift aside and began the loosening up moves that would prepare her for more strenuous exercising.

Poet-Warrior

She thought she was calm, resolute, but she couldn’t get the key in the keyhole. Her hand was shaking. Fool, she thought, oh god. She flattened her right hand against the wallboard, braced herself and tried again. The key slid in, turned. “That’s one.” Two locks to go. She took a deep breath, shook the keys along the ring. The Havingee special was easy enough to find, a burred cylinder, not flat like the others. She got it in, managed the left turn and started the right but for a moment she forgot the obligatory twitch and tried to force the key where it didn’t go.

Again she sucked in a breath, let it trickle out, then leaned her forehead against the door’s cracking paint, trembling as if someone had pulled the plug on her strength.

“You all right?” A quiet voice behind her, not threatening, but she whirled, heart thudding. “There something I could do?”

The young man from the apartment by the head of the stairs-he’d come down the hall to stand behind her. Only a boy, can’t be more than early twenties. He looked tired and worried, some of it about her. She remembered, or thought she did, that his friend worked as a male nurse and had a bad moment wondering if he’d seen the disease in her. But that was nonsense. Even she wouldn’t know about it if the photogram hadn’t shown lump shadows in her breast, if the probe hadn’t pronounced them malignant. She tried a tight smile, shook her head. “I was just remembering. When I was a little girl living on our farm in the house my great-grandfather built, we kept a butterknife by the back door. I learned to slip locks early.” She smiled again, more easily. “We locked that door when we went to town and opened it with that knife when we got back. No one’d even seen the key for fifty years. The farm was between a commune and a cult, you see, and no one ever bothered us.” She held up her key ring. “Triple locked,” she said. “Sometimes it gets me down.’

He nodded, seeming tired. “Yeah,” he said. “I know. Well, anytime.”

She watched him go back to his apartment. He must have followed her up the stairs. She hadn’t noticed him, but she wasn’t in any state to notice anything that didn’t bite her. She twitched the key, finished its turns, dealt with the cheap lock the landlord had provided, pushed the door open and went inside, forgetting the boy before the door was shut behind her.

In the living room she snapped on the TV without thinking, turned to stare at it, startled by the sudden burst of sound, the flicker of shadow pictures across the screen. She reached out to click it off, then changed her mind and only turned the sound down until it was a meaningless burring that filled the emptiness of the room. She kicked off her shoes, walked around the room picking things up, putting them down, finally dumped the mail out of her purse. The power bill she hadn’t had the courage to open for three days now. A begging letter from the Altiran society, probably incensed about the PM’s newest attack on the parks. She sent them money whenever she could. Money. Her hand shook suddenly. She dropped the rest of the mail. A brown envelope slid from the table to the floor. A story. Rejected. One she thought she’d sold, they kept it six months, asked for and got revisions of several sections. She pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes and fought for control. “Oh, god, where am I going to get the money?”

With a small impatient sound, she took her hands from her eyes and dropped onto the couch to stare blankly at the phantoms cavorting on the TV screen. After a minute she swung her feet up and stretched out on the lumpy cushions.

She wasn’t afraid, not the way her doctor thought. Jim wasn’t really good at passing on bad news. Cancer. Still a frightening word. Caught early, as he’d caught hers, no big problem. If she had the money for the operation. If she had the money. Jim wanted her in the hospital immediately, the sooner the better. Hospital. She closed her hands into fists and pressed them down on her betraying flesh. Money. She didn’t have it and could see no way of getting it.

Her independence, her comfortable solitude, these were hard won and fragile, all dependent on the health of her body. There was never enough money to squeeze out insurance premiums. Never enough money for anything extra. Not for a car, though public transit here was an unfunny joke. (Even if she could afford to buy the car, she couldn’t afford the rent on an offstreet lockup, and any car left on the street overnight was stripped or stolen by morning.) Not enough for vacation trips; those she did take were for background on books so she could write them off her taxes. But with all that, she liked her life in her shabby rooms, she needed the solitude. No lovers now, no one taking up her life and energy. And she didn’t miss that… that intrusion. She smiled. Her dearly unbeloved ex-husband would be shocked out of his shoes by the way she lived, then smugly pleased. He’d been pleased enough when she stopped alimony after only a year. Not that he’d ever paid it on time. She’d gotten sick of having to go see him when the rent came due. She started her first novel and got a job in the city welfare office, wearing and poorly paid, testing her idealism to the full, but she liked most of the other workers and she liked the idea of helping people even when they proved all too fallibly human.

The last time she saw Hrald, she sat across an office table from him and smiled into his handsome face-big blond man with even, white teeth and melting brown eyes that promised gentleness and understanding. They lied, oh how they did lie. Not trying very hard to conceal her contempt for him, she told him she wanted nothing at all from him, not now, not ever again. He was both pleased and irritated, pleased because he grudged her every cent since she was no longer endlessly promoting him to his friends and colleagues, irritated because he enjoyed making her beg for money as she’d had to beg during the marriage. While she was waiting for the papers, she studied him with a detached coolness she hadn’t been sure she could achieve, let alone maintain. How young I was when I first met him. Just out of college. There he was, this smiling handsome man on his way up, moving fast through his circumscribed world, expecting and getting the best that life could offer him, taking her to fine restaurants, to opening nights, to places she’d only read about, showing her a superficial good taste that impressed her then; she was too young and inexperienced to recognize how specious it was, a replica in plastic of hand-made elegance. It had taken her five years to learn how empty he was, to understand why he’d chosen to marry her, a girl with no money, no family, no connections, supporting herself on miserable shit jobs, yessir-nosir jobs, playing at writing, too ignorant about life to have anything to say. Control-he could control her and she couldn’t threaten him in anything he thought was important.

He was brilliant, so everyone said. Made all the right moves. No lie, he was brilliant. Within his narrow limits. Outside those, though, he was incredibly stupid. For a long time she couldn’t believe how stupid he could be. How willfully blind. Will to power. Willed ignorance. They seem inextricably linked as if the one is impossible without the other. His cohorts and fellow string-pullers-couldn’t call them friends, they didn’t understand the meaning of the word-were all just like him. There were times at the end of the five years when I’d look at them and see them as alien creatures. Not human at all. I was certainly out of place in that herd. Vanity, Julia. She smiled, shook her head. Vanity will get you in the end.

She stared at the ceiling. Fifteen years since she’d thought much about him. Since she’d had to think about him. Recently, though, he’d been on TV a lot, pontificating about something on the news or on some forum or other. He was into politics now, cautiously, not running yet but accumulating experience in appointive positions and building up a credit line of favors and debts he could call in when he needed them. Rumor said he was due to announce any day now that he was a candidate for Domain Pacifica’s state minister, backed by the Guardians of Liberty and Morality. Book-burner types. She’d gotten some mean letters from GLAM, letters verging on the actionable with their denunciations and accusations of treason and subversion.

She thought about embarrassing Hrald into paying for her operation. A kind of blackmail, threatening to complain to the cameras if he didn’t come through. The fastest way to get money. It would take time to get through the endless paperwork of the bureaucracy if she applied for emergency aid and she had little enough time right now. He had money in fistfuls and he’d get a lot of pleasure out of making her squirm. His ex-wife, the critically acclaimed, prize-winning author (minor critics and a sort-of prize, but what the hell). Authoress, he’d call her, having that kind of mind. He could get reams of publicity out of his noble generosity-if he didn’t shy off because her books were loudly condemned by some of his most valued supporters. She thought of it, started working out the snags, but she didn’t like the price in self-respect she’d have to pay. I’ve heard people say they’d rather die than do something. Never believed, it, always thought it was exaggerated or just nonsense. Not anymore. I’d really rather die than ask him for money. She rubbed her eyes, sat up, running her hands through short thick hair rapidly going gray.

No use sitting here moaning, she thought. She looked about the room. Not much use in anything. She glanced at the TV screen. What the hell? Gun battle? Police and anonymous shadows trading shots. She thought about turning up the sound, but didn’t bother. No point in listening to the newsman’s hysterical chatter. They were all hysterical these days, not one of them touching on the root causes of much of this unrest. The rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer and more desperate. When you’ve got nothing to lose but your life, what’s that life worth anyway? In recent months she’d thought about leaving the country, but inertia and a lingering hope that this too would pass away had kept her where she was. Hope and the book she was finishing. It exhausted her and was probably a useless expenditure of her energy. There was still a steady market for her books, loyal readers, bless their gentle hearts, but her editor had begun warning her the House was going to make major changes in anything she sent them, even in the books already published, so they could keep them on the shelves. “You’re being burned all over the country,” he said. “The money men are getting nervous.”

She watched the battle run to its predictable end (blood, bodies, clouds of teargas, smoky fires), and thought about her life. Most people would consider it bleak beyond enduring but it suited her. A half-dozen good friends (ex-lovers, ex-colleagues, ex-clients that she called now and then, whenever she felt the need to talk), who called her when they had something to say, had dinner with her now and then. Sometimes they met for a night of drinking and talking and conjuring terrible fates for all their enemies. Those friends would help all they could. If she asked. But she wouldn’t ask. They were as poor as she was and had families or other responsibilities. And there were a few acquaintances she exchanged smiles with. And a handful of men not more than acquaintances now, left over from the time just after the divorce when she was running through lovers like sticks of gum, frightened of being alone. They sent flowers on her birthday and cards at the new-year Turn-fкte, invited her to parties now and then, slept with her if they happened to meet her and both were in the mood.

And there was Simon who was something between an acquaintance and a friend, a historian she’d consulted about details she needed for her third book. He’d got her a temporary second job as lecturer and writer-in-residence at Loomis where he was tenured professor and one of the better teachers. He’d asked her to marry him one night, grown reckless with passion, liquor and loneliness, but neither of them really wanted that kind of entanglement. He’d groused a bit when she turned him down, and for over a year refused to admit the relief he felt, his vanity singed until she managed to convince him she simply didn’t want to live with anyone, it wasn’t just him she was refusing.

That was the truth. It pleased her to shut the door on the world. And as the years passed, she grew increasingly more reluctant to let anyone past that door. I’m getting strange, she thought. She grinned at the grimacing face of the commentator mouthing soundless words at her from the screen. Good for me. Being alone was sometimes a hassle-when she had to find someone to witness a signature or serve as a credit reference or share a quiet dinner to celebrate a royalty check (few good restaurants these days would serve single women). But on the whole she lived her solitary life with a quiet relish.

A life that was shattering around her now. She contemplated the ruin of fifteen years’ hard slogging labor with a calm that was partly exhaustion and partly despair.

The Priestess

Nilis sat in the littered room at the tower’s top, watching moonlight drop like smoke through the breaking, clouds. The earth was covered with snow, new snow that caught the vagrant light and glowed it back at the clouds. Cold wind came through the unglazed arches, coiled about her, sucking at her body’s heat. She pulled the quilt tighter about her shoulders, patted her heavy sleeping shift down over her feet and legs, tucked the quilt about them.

For the first time since she’d joined the Followers she was disobeying one of the Agli’s directions, disobeying deliberately. A woman at night was to be in her bed; only an urgent call of nature excused her leaving it. Nilis smiled, something she’d done so little of late her face seemed to crack. Being here is a call of nature, she thought. And urgent.

A tenday ago the sun changed and the snow began to fall. About that time she gave up trying to scourge herself into one-time fervor and admitted to herself how much she missed her family, even Tuli who was about as sweet as an unripe chays. Dris didn’t fill that emptiness in her. She sighed, dabbed her nose with the edge of the quilt. Dris was a proper little Follower. Treated her like a chattel, ordered her about, tattled on her to the Agli, showed her no affection. She’d ignored that aspect of the Soдreh credo; at least, had never applied it to herself. The ties, yes, but she was torma now, didn’t that mean anything? Certainly, Dris was Tarom, but that shouldn’t mean she was nothing. He was only six. She whispered the Soдreh chant: to woman is appointed house and household/ woman is given to man for his comfort and his use/ she bears his children and ministers unto him/ she is cherished and protected by his strength/ she is guided by his wisdom/ blessed be Soдreh who makes woman teacher and tender and tie. She’d learned the words but hadn’t bothered to listen to what she learned. Given to man for his use. She shivered.

She’d always been jealous of the younger ones: Sanani, Tuli, Teras, even little Dris who could be a real brat. They all seemed to share a careless charm, a joy in life that brought warmth and acceptance from everyone around them, no matter how thoughtless they were. Life was easy for them in ways that were utterly unfair. Easier even from conception. Her mother had had a difficult time with her, she’d heard the tie-women talking about it, several of the older tie-girls made sure she knew just how much trouble she’d given everyone. She’d been a sickly, whining baby, a shy withdrawn child, over-sensitive to slights the others either didn’t notice or laughed off, with a grudging temperament and a smoldering rage she could only be rid of by playing tricks she knew were mean and sly on whoever roused that anger. She hated this side of her nature and fought against it with all her strength-which was never strength enough. And no one helped. Her mother didn’t like her. Annic was kind and attentive, but that was out of duty, not love. Nilis felt the difference cruelly when the other children were about. Sanani was shy and quiet too, but she was good with people, she charmed them as quickly and perhaps more effectively than Tuli did with her laughing exuberance. Year after year she’d watched the difference in the way people reacted to her. She was quiet and polite, eager to please, but so clumsy and often mistaken in her eagerness that she put people off.

She stared at the opaline shift of the moonlight, sick and cold. Try and try. Fight off resentment and anger and humiliation and loneliness. And nothing helped, no one helped, nothing changed the isolation.

Soдreh caught her on a double hook, offering her the closeness she’d yearned for all her life and a chance to pay off old scores-though she’d blinded herself to the second enticement. The old fault in new disguise. The tiluns left her exalted, warmed, enfolded in the lives of the others there as the Maiden fкtes had not, had only made her feel all the more left out. She was the kind deed, brought into the celebration by a generosity that was genuine and not at all mocking, but it was a generosity that she bitterly resented. She burned at the careless kindness of young men who swung her now and then into the dance but never into the laughing mischievous bands of pranksters winding through the crowds. She convinced herself she despised such lawlessness even as she gazed wistfully after them.

As the years passed and the disappointments piled up, she grew mean and hard and resentful, renouncing the fruitless struggle to fight that wretched spiteful side of herself. But she hated what she’d become.

Then Soдreh and then Floarin’s edict and then her rivals were swept away. Sanani and Tuli and Teras, they were swept away. Father and mother swept away too. She regretted that but would not let herself grieve for them, told herself it was their fault not hers. At first she watched the changes at the tar with triumph and satisfaction. There was calm and order within the House. Tie-women were grave and quiet and submissive; there were no more resentful glances, mocking titters, no more flirting with tie-men and wandering day laborers. No more groups that closed against her.

As the months passed, she gradually realized that she was still outside of everything. The groups never closed against her but never really incorporated her. She had no friends. It was all fear. It took a while for her to acknowledge this but she was neither stupid nor blind and certainly not insensitive to atmosphere. She could fool herself only so long. Then the rebels turned the Agli into a dangling clown doll and another was sent to replace him. The new Agli merely tolerated her and avoided her when he could. The tilun became a kind of agony for her. She no longer went to the confession fire, and because she did not she soon realized that the exaltation was born from drugged incense and the Agli’s meddling. She saw in the faces around her all that she despised in herself and felt a growing contempt for them. And for herself.

There was no laughter left in Cymbank or at Gradintar. The fist of Floarin and the Agli closed so tightly about her she choked.

She stared at the shifting shadows and pearly light and saw the clouds being stripped from the face of Nijilic TheDom as a paradigm of the way illusion had been stripped from her. It was hard, very hard, to admit to herself she could no longer submit to Soдreh. It meant she could no longer deny her responsibility in the betrayal and outlawing of her family. During the last passage she’d flinched repeatedly from this admission. She looked out at the naked face of TheDom and let the last of her excuses blow away like the winds had blown away the clouds.

This morning (the Agli standing beside him, hand on his shoulder) Dris had called the tie-men into the convocation Hall. She had watched from the shadows high up the stairs, forbidden to be present, forbidden to speak. Watched as Dris read names of tie-men from the list and told them they were being sent to Oras to fight in Floarin’s army. Fully half the men. Rations would be continued to their families as long as they were obedient and fought well for the manchild, in the cradle in Oras. They were told to rejoice in their calling as their absence would serve their families as well as Soдreh’s son-on-earth, Floarin’s child, since they would no longer be eating at Gradintar’s tables, and those left behind would be less apt to starve. Nilis watched the still faces of the chosen, the still faces of the not-yet-chosen. This was the second levy on the already culled tie-men. No one knew if or how soon another levy would come.

When the Hall was empty, both sets of men filing out without having uttered a single word, the Agli turned to Dris, “Halve the rations for the women and children of the chosen,” he said. “Order the torma to see that none of the other families give from their tables. The men must be kept strong to serve Soдreh should he require that service.”

Hearing this, she knew what was going to be required of her. Prying into larders, visiting the tie-houses to make sure there were no extras at table, more… and if she refused, she’d be turned out herself. She could go into the mountains after the outcasts, or be forced into the House of Repentance. Either place was death for her now; in spite of everything she did not want to die. The load of guilt she carried frightened her. There had to be some way she could redeem herself. Had to be.

Something moved in the corner not far from her. She heard the rustle of clothing, the soft scrape of a sandal against the stone. She swallowed hard but didn’t move.

An old woman walked around her and groaned as she sat down facing Nilis. She leaned forward, held out a broad strong hand. Nilis reached out, hesitantly, not sure why she did so. The old woman’s hand closed about hers. Warmth flowed into Nilis, a love greater than any she’d known to yearn for. She smiled and wept as she smiled. She laughed and the old woman laughed with her. They sat as they were a timeless time. The Jewels rose, crossed the open arch, vanished. Somewhere a hunting kanka vented a portion of its float gas in a hungry wail. Finally Nilis spoke. “What must I do?”

“Cleanse the Maiden Shrine.”

Nilis licked dry lips. “That sounds such a little thing. Can’t I do more?”

The old woman said nothing; her large lustrous eyes were warm and encouraging, but gave Nilis no more help than that.

Nilis fidgeted. Then she bowed her head. “Forgive me.”

“Forgive yourself.”

“I can’t.” The words were a broken whisper. Nilis stared at hands twisting nervously.

“Look within.”

“I can’t, I can’t bear what I see.”

“Learn to bear it. You are no more perfect or imperfect than any other. How can you bless them for being if you can’t bless your being?” The quiet voice became insistent. “Daughter, you asked for something harder but you did not know what you were asking. Cleanse the shrine. Make a sign for the people. It won’t be easy and it won’t come quickly; it may take the whole of your life. But a sign can be far stronger than many swords.

The old woman looked gravely at her. “You’ll be cold and hungry, you’ll feel the old rancors and invent new ones, you’ll doubt yourself, the Maiden, the worth of what you’re doing. Some folk from both sides of the present war will spit on you, will never forgive you for what they call your treachery, will remind you day on day on day of what you have done. Know that before you take up what we lay on you.”

“I know.” She calmed her fingers, flattened them on her thighs. “Nothing changes, it will be as it was before.”

“There will be compensations. But you’ll have to be very patient.”

“You mean me for Shrine Keeper.”

“Yes. The first of the new Keepers.” The old woman smiled. And changed. Suddenly standing, she was a wand-slim maiden, young and fresh and smelling of herbs and flowers, pale hair floating gossamer light about a face of inhuman majesty and beauty, translucent as if it had been sculpted from the night air. That air thrummed about her, shimmered with the power radiating from her. At first her eyes were the same, smiling, compassionate, a little sad, then they shone with a stern, demanding light. Then she faded, melting into the night, leaving behind the delicate odors of spring blooms and fresh herbs.

Stiff with cold, Nilis went slowly down the stairs and into the dark empty halls of the House. She went to the chests in her mother’s room, found the old white robe she remembered. She stripped off her sleeping shift, pulled the robe over her head. It hung on her. She found a length of cord and tied it about her waist, pulled the robe up so it bloused over the cord and swung clear of the floor.

She went back to her room, walking quickly, the floors were icy, drafts curled about her booted ankles and crawled up her legs. She sat on her bed and took off her fur-lined boots, frowning down at them as she tried to remember what the Keepers of the past wore on their feet. With a sigh she stood, put the boots away and got out her summer sandals. She strapped them on, got her fur-lined cloak from the peg behind the door, held it up, smoothed her hand over the soft warm fur. Forgive yourself, she thought, smiled, and tossed it onto the quilts. Sacrifice was one thing, stupidity another. She laughed suddenly, not caring whether she woke anyone or brought them to find out what was going on. Joy bubbled in a glimmering golden fountain from her heels to her head, burst from her in little chuckles. She stood with her head thrown back, her arms thrown out as if she would embrace the world. She wanted to shout, to dance, to sing. She loved everything that was and would be and had been, even the aglis. All and all and all.

When the excess of joy boiled out of her, she went back to collecting things she’d need at the Shrine. She found a worn leather satchel with a broken strap that Tuli, for some reason, had rescued from a pile of discards then forgotten. With quick neat stitches she repaired the shoulder strap, then laid the bag on the bed and began packing it with what she had collected, from her comb to a pack of needles and thread. Then she rolled a pair of quilts into a tight firm cylinder about some changes of underthings and an old pair of knitted slippers, tied it together with bits of cord and made a long loop from end to end so she could carry it as she did the satchel and leave her hands free. Then she took the ties from the braids that skinned her fine brown hair back from her face, ran her fingers through it with a sigh of relief and pleasure.

The fur cloak bunched under her arm, the satchel and quilt bundle slung from her shoulder, her hair flowing loose, she went through the silent sleeping House and down into the kitchen.

Ignoring the startled disapproving look from the old woman Tuli and Teras called Auntee Cook, she took a fresh-baked loaf of bread from the rack where it was cooling, put it in the satchel, went into the pantry, took a round of cheese from the shelves that seemed to her to be emptying far too fast, added a cured posser haunch, smiled, fingered a crock of the chorem jam she liked above all the others. Forgive yourself, she told herself, take pleasure in the good things of the earth so you won’t grudge them to others. The words came into her head as if someone whispered them to her. She tucked the jam in beside the other things, went back into the kitchen. She found a canister of cha leaves, added them to her hoard. The leather was sagging and creaking under the weight. She began to worry a little about her stitching, hoping it would hold. She collected a mug and a plate, other supplies she thought she might need, packed these into a bucket with a large pumice stone and some rags. The sides of the satchel bulged so that she could not buckle down the flap, but it closed enough to keep snow out if the sky clouded over again and a new storm started. She looked around the kitchen, her tongue caught between her teeth, but there was nothing she could see that would be worth the difficulty in hauling it with her.

Auntee Cook watched all this, dazed. As Nilis started for the door to the outside, she gulped and burst into rapid speech, “Torma, it’s against the rules, you know it is, I’m just, a poor old tie-woman, I can’t go against you, but how can I go against tarom Dris or the Agli, Soдreh grant him long life? You know it’s against the rules, what can I tell him, them, anyone? What can I say? What can I do? Tell me. What? You tell me, you…”

Nilis burst out laughing, a joyous sound that stopped the old woman in mid-sentence and made her eyes bulge. Still chuckling, Nilis kissed the withered cheek, patted the rounded shoulder. “Just tell them what happened,” she said. “Don’t worry, little Auntee, you couldn’t help it, it’s not your business to tell me what to do.” Humming an old tune, she danced down the steps and plunged into the drifts outside, plowing toward the barns and the macain sleeping in the stalls.

The Magic Child

The snow fell, flake by flake, drifting softly onto withered half-burnt foliage, a strangely unemphatic break from the unnatural heat. It didn’t even seem cold, though the macain they rode were beginning to complain; they had to wade through those feathery nothings that were suddenly more clotted and obdurate than frozen mush. Tuli brushed snow off her face, glanced at Rane and was startled to see the ex-meie only as a fuzzy shadow; she was barely visible through the thickening curtain of falling snow. There was no wind and sound continued to be sharp and clear, she could hear the crunch of her macai’s pads, his disgusted snorting, the creak of the saddle, the jingle of the chains and other metal bits. She wiggled her fingers. They were starting to get cold. “Rane,” she called. “Don’t you think we should camp?”

“No.” The ex-meie’s voice sounded close, almost in Tuli’s ear. “Not a good idea. Lower we go, more likely the wind is to pick up. We need cold-weather gear. I have to admit, I didn’t expect so much so soon.”

Tuli rode in silence for a while. The snowfall thickened yet more, blotting out everything around her, the trees and the rutted road and Rane. According to the feel of the saddle against her thighs and buttocks they were still going downhill, but that seemed a chancy thing to rely on for guidance. “Rane.”

“What?”

“We still on the road?”

“Yes.”

“How can you tell?”

“You running your nose into any trees? Trust your mount, he’ll keep you to the road. Her voice crackled with impatience. “Stop fussing, just ride.”

Tuli closed her lips tight over the words crowding on her tongue. When Rane got like that, there was no use talking to her. She shook the snow off her head, brushed at her shoulders and thighs; the stuff was starting to pile up everywhere it could get a hold.

The snow fell in copious silence, there was still no wind and the ride went on, down and down and down, getting colder the lower they went. The macain kept up their moans and whiny roars, voicing their distaste for the footing and the weather and their riders. The beasts were tired and hungry like their riders and like their riders they hadn’t had time to change for the change in the season. The prolonged unnatural heat conjured by the Nearga Nor had kept them unnaturally long in their summer hides and this sudden drop in temperature was triggering the winter-change far too quickly, putting strain on their tempers and their strength. Her macai began jerking his head about, trying to get his teeth in her leg, his hoots turning angry when the bridle hurt his mouth as she pulled his head back around. Once, he started to kneel, but she coaxed him up and urged him on though she wasn’t sure Rane was right about going on. Maybe it would be better to find a sheltered spot, get a fire going and wait out the storm. But that depended on how long the storm was going to hang about; some stopped in one day, some went on for a tenday. The way things were messed up, there was no telling about this one. Snow crawled down her neck and into her boots. It spilled onto her shoulders and down the front of her shirt, got into the pockets and cuffs of her thin jacket. Her body heat half-melted it, it froze again as soon as more snow piled on. Her shoulders and back, her thighs and arms were all damp, shirt, jacket, trousers and hair were sodden and clinging clammily to her. Her feet were growing numb, her hands burned from the chill, and still there wasn’t much wind, just enough to make the snow slant a bit. She pulled her jacket cuffs down over her hands, crooking her arms inside the sleeves to give her some extra length; that helped a little, shut out some of the freezing wet. She hunched her shoulders and tried to trust Rane, though it was seeming more and more stupid to ride away from the Biserica in only their summer clothes when they knew the weather was going to break. She drew her mouth down. Be fair, she thought. I didn’t think of it either; I didn’t open my mouth and say go back. Anyway, who’d have thought the snow would come so fast once the sun was right?

The road flattened out and the snow grew thicker, wetter. The wind was suddenly blowing into their faces with stinging force. The quiet vanished and the cold got worse, fast. Tuli started shivering so hard she thought she was going to shake herself right out of the saddle. Rane left her side and rode in front, blocking the worst of the wind’s force.

After another eternity of straining to follow the seen-unseen shadow in front of her, Tuli heard the rush of running water, then they were on a low humped bridge. Creeksajin, she thought. It can’t be too much farther before we stop.

Tuli’s macai bumped his nose into the haunches of the beast Rane rode, stopped. Rane dismounted and came to stand at Tuli’s knee. “There’s a turn we have to make just ahead.” She was shouting but Tuli had to bend down and listen hard to catch the words the wind was tossing and shredding. “I’m going to walk awhile, feel my way, but I could miss it in this mess. Keep your eyes, open for a hedgerow. You see one on your right, we’ve gone past the turn and will have to come back. You hear?”

Tuli shouted her acknowledgment, felt a pat on the thigh, then the lanky figure-faded into the whirling snow.

And came back a moment later with the end of a rope. “Tie this someplace,” Rane shouted. “Keep us together, this will.” She shoved the rope at Tuli. Her fingers were clumsy and as cold as Tuli’s.

They went on, it seemed forever, the wind battering them, the cold numbing them, but this eased a little when Rane found the mouth of the lane and they turned into the meager protection of the lines of trees that grew thickly on both sides of the rutted track.

A long time later Rane stopped again. As Tuli’s mount stomped restlessly about, she caught glimpses of stone pillars and a wooden gate.

Moving again-along a curving entranceway similar to the one at Gradintar, Tuli felt a surge of homesickness. Tears froze on her eyelashes as she blinked.

Stopped again. Behind a high flat surface that kept the wind off. Rane leaned to her, pinched her arm. “Wait here. You hear me?”

Tuli nodded, croaked, “I hear.”

Time passed. An eternity of black and cold. Hoots of misery from her macai. Nothing to measure the moments against, just darkness and wind noise and slanting snow.

Then someone was beside her. Rane. Someone beside Rane, a long thin shadow.

And the beast under her was moving, Rane’s macai moving beside her.

And there was a grating sound-not too loud but she could hear it over the roar of the wind.

And they were out of the wind, going down a long slant into darkness-but the snow was gone and the air was warmer. As she woke out of the numbness, she began to shiver without letup.

The darkness lightened as they turned one way. Lightened more as they turned another.

They stopped.

A stable of sorts, straw on the floor, water and grain, a fire off in the distance filling a long narrow room with warmth and a cheerful crackling.

She felt the warmth but she couldn’t stop shivering. Hands pulled at her.

She was standing rubber-kneed on the stone floor, hands holding her.

A MAN’S VOICE: Hot cha, I think.

RANE: Any chance of a hot bath?

MAN: Depends on how many people do you want to alert you’re here?

RANE: No one would be best. Other than you, Hal. I suspect everyone now, old friend, everyone I don’t know as well as I know you.

MAN: (chuckling) Eh-Rane, you sure you know me well enough?

RANE: Fool.

All the while they talked they were helping Tuli stumble closer to the fire. They eased her down on a pile of old quilts and cushions and Rane knelt beside her, rubbing her frozen hands.

RANE: Is it too much to ask for the cha you offered?

MAN: Hold your barbs, scorpion. Have it here in a breath and a half.

Heat. Hands stripped soggy clothes off her. Hands rubbed a coarse towel hard, over her. She protested. It hurt. Rane laughed, dropped the towel over her head. “Do it yourself then, Moth.”

They were at one end of a windowless room with roughly dressed stone walls. The loudest noise was the crackling of the fire; Tuli caught not the slightest hint of the storm outside. At the other end of the long room one of the macain had his nose dipped into a trough, sucking up water. The other was munching at a heap of corn. Both made low cooing sounds full of contentment.

A contentment Tuli shared. When her short hair was as dry as she could get it, she dropped the towel and pulled the quilt up over her shoulders. She stretched out in front of the fire on the pile of cushions, soaking up the heat until she wanted to purr.

Later. Dressed in boy’s clothing, long in the leg and tight about the buttocks, she sipped at the steaming spiced cha and struggled to keep her eyes open as Rane talked with the man she called Hal.

RANE: How are the Followers taking this weather change? Asking questions of the Agli? Blaming us? Angry? Confused? What?

HAL: Hard to say. Most of them are dupes. Agli doesn’t tell them anything, keeps them happy with a tilun now and then and promises of a better life. We have to sit through interminable sermons on the virtues of submission and the evils of pride. Soдreh’s will. I wonder how many times I’ve heard that over the past few days. I want to spit in their faces. Very disconcerting for a placid soul like myself. That’s about all I’ve got for you, gossip from the rats in my own walls. I’ve stayed away from Sadnaji since the heat broke. Followers there’ve turned nasty, bite off any head that pokes out. I’m exceedingly fond of my head.

RANE: We came through Sadnaji a few days ago. Looked dead.

HAL: Might as well be. None of the fкte-days being kept, no one laughing. We’ve all forgotten how to laugh.

RANE: Braddon’s Inn was shut down, torch out. I never thought they’d go that far. What happened? Where were all his friends? Is he all right?

HAL: Friends. (He shakes his head.) Those of us nearby keep our mouths shut and don’t look him in the eye. He’s alive, doing well as could be expected. (He goes silent a moment, the lines suddenly deeper in his long ugly face, a gentle face, mournful as a droop-eared chinihound.) His son’s in the mountains somewhere, I expect you’ve got a better idea about that than I do. Somewhere’s close as I can get (a sigh). Shut Braddon down, put him in the House of Repentance. For a while it looked like the Agli was going to burn him out, but he backed off, Sadnaji was tinder dry. The little meie, she managed to burn a good bit of hedge (sigh). Had to spend a tenday setting posts and planting hedge sets. Which will probably freeze if this keeps up.

RANE: Little meie? What happened?

HAL: It was just after the sky went bad. The little meie showed up at Braddon’s, you know who I mean, Serroi, a man with her. Braddon says he tried to hold her there but she got suspicious and tunked him on the head. He won’t say else to anyone. He says he didn’t know the man with her, never saw him before. Whispers say it was Hern (shrug). She tangled with a norit staying there, turned the attack back on him somehow, she and the man both got away, traded their worked-out macain for a fresh pair, took the norit’s mounts which steamed him some to hear tell. He went after them, wouldn’t wait for anyone, anything. Agli rounded him up a mob, took three guards from the Decsel in the Center, sent them all after her. What happened to the norit, Maiden knows, but there’s a man-sized charred spot in my pasture grass. Guards came chasing her through the gap in my poor abused hedge. First one through was an air-head carrying a torch. Soon’s he was on the grass his macai went crazy, threw him and tromped on him. He let go the damn torch and it landed in my hedge. Agli’s mob, they had to stop being a mob and fight the fire or Sadnaji could have gone up too. The two guards left followed the meie and her friend, got back a couple days later, hungry and tired, scratched up and scratching-idiots didn’t know enough to stay away from ripe puffballs-feeling mad and mean. Lost the meie in the foothills past the ford.

RANE: Yael-mri thinks she’s the one turned the weather for us (laugh). For such a little thing, her efforts they do multiply. I’d like to be around when she tells the tale of the past few months. Well, enough of that. To business. Guards. How many here now?

HAL: Three decsettin. One in town, the others quartered on the tars. I’ve got one here, Decsel sleeping in the house, his men in the tie-village. And a resident norit (he holds up a hand). No worry. He’s a smoke eater who hates the cold. I looked in on him an hour ago. Room stinks of the weed and he’s lost in his private heaven.

RANE: Sleykynin?

HAL: They’ve been trickling into the mijloc by twos and threes, see some of them almost every day. A few large bands of young ones, just hatched from their houses (smile). Was a break in the trickle shortly after the little meie went through here. Coincidence?

RANE: (laughing) I wouldn’t bet on it. Do they stay around Sadnaji or move on?

HAL: Three or four are quartered on the Agli, been there for a while. Those coming through lately keep on without stopping. Going north.

RANE: Anything else?

HAL: Got a vague report of Kapperim busy in the hills east of Sankoy. Before the snow started. I went on a ride to check my hedges, make the circuit like a good tarom.

RANE: Hal! You?

HAL: Uh-huh, Anders was trying to convert me, following me around preaching at me. Eh-Rane, he’s such a block. You suppose Marilli played me false? (he grins) No, probably not. She was too proud a woman to tarnish her perfection that way. I suppose he’s a throwback to Grandfather Lammah who had just two ideas in his head. If it was game, chase and kill it, if it was female… (he catches Tuli watching and does not finish the sentence). Where was I? Ah. Anders. Had to get away from him before I strangled him. Not a thing you want to do to your son and heir. So I rode the hedges. Smuggled a book out with me, Dancer’s Rise writ by Mad Shar the poet, you should know it, Biserica’s got a copy, that and a skin of a nice little wine. Point of all this-I was sitting in the shade near the east end of the tar. Half-asleep. Maybe a little drunk. A pair of shurin came out of the shadows and squatted beside me. Said to pass this on: Army massing in Sankoy, waiting to join the one Floarin’s bringing down from Oras. And the Kapperim tribes are getting thick in the hills, might be going to start raiding the outcast Havens, might be joining up with Floarin too, when the time comes. That was a tenday ago. I was thinking maybe I’d have to carry the news myself if somebody didn’t come by. Not a good idea sending message fliers, too many traxim about.

RANE: So Yael-mri said. Tuli and I, we’re going looking the long way round Cimpia Plain, see what’s happening firsthand.

HAL: You’re taking the child?

RANE: Peace, Hal. Tuli stopped being a child awhile ago. (she stares at the fire, runs her hands through hair like short sun-bleached straw). There are no noncombatants in this war, my philosopher friend.

HAL: Why is this happening? (He looks from Rane to Tuli, back at Rane, then stares into the fire as she does). What have we done to bring this death and desolation of the spirit?

RANE: (Smiling at him, reaching over to put her hand on his.) Ah, my friend, I have missed this, sitting with you in front of a fire and solving the problems of the world. Seriously, why does it have anything to do with us? Perhaps it’s five hundred years of stagnation. All things die sometime, now it’s our time. From our death something new will be born.

HAL: The Maiden? Rane. (Shakes his head.)

RANE. We dance at the Maidenfкtes, but when they’re done the Keeper dowses the festfire. We’re tired, happy, flown on wine and hard cider, ready to find our beds, so we forget what the dowsing means. Eh-Hal, all that makes lovely symbols for scholars to play with while the rest of us mundane souls go our ways looking for what comfort we can find in life. I’ve been thinking for several years now that the mijloc was ripe for trouble. Forget about symbols. Think about this. Too many ties for the land to support. Too many tar-sons and tar-daughters. Oldest son gets the tar, but what do his brothers do? Hang around, get drunk, make trouble with the ties, the other taroms, do some hunting. If he’s got any intelligence and ambition, then he’s got a chance. Go into the Guards, get an appointment as a court scholar, get himself apprenticed to a merchant if he’s got that kind of interest and ability. Some just drift away, losing themselves in the world outside the mijloc. You didn’t have to worry about that, Hal, only one living son and two daughters, one married, one with us at the Biserica. But what about your grandsons and granddaughters? How many children does Anders already have? His wife is young and healthy. How many more children will she have? How will he provide for them? If he’s lucky his extra sons will find their own ways, Guards, merchants, scholars, artisans, even maybe a player in the bunch. What about his daughters? Some will marry. The others? Let me tell you, the valley is bursting with girls. We’ve been taking care of excess daughters for generations but there’s a limit to the numbers we can support. There are other limits. Some girls just aren’t happy with us. Many of the girls that come to us don’t stay more than a few years. Some go home, find husbands, or work for their keep in the homes of their married sisters. Some drift into the cities; the best of them find work, the others walk the streets. Think about it, Hal. All the discarded children. Thieves, vagabonds, drunks, bullies, prostitutes, landless laborers, drifters of all kinds, a drain on the resources of the mijloc, a constant source of discontent. Think about the bad harvests this year and last, the Gather and Scatter storms. People getting hungrier and hungrier, watching the taroms and the rich merchants and resenting them, the taroms and merchants growing frightened, hiring bravos to protect them. The Heslin peace falling apart. Well, all that’s irrelevant now, Hal. The mijloc is going to be chewed up so thoroughly there’ll be no going back to the old ways. Change. There’s no stopping it and no knowing what direction it will take.

HAL (sighing): And no room in it for peaceful souls like me. Back to the bad old days before Andellate Heslin knocked the belligerence out of the warlords. Every man’s hand raised against his neighbor and the landless left to starve. Eh-Rane, if the Nor do me in, I’d almost thank them.

RAKE: Back to business, old philosopher. Practical things have their charm. How are the ordinary folk feeling? Not the converted, the others.

HAL: All this happened so fast, most folk were stunned; it came on them boom-boom, they didn’t have time to react or work themselves up to resisting. They’re beginning to stir now, just need a leader. With Anders putting on the black so fast, it took a while before the ties would talk to me, but I’ve picked up a few things. Example: Our folk grumbled when the Gorduufest was cancelled, then they got together and made a little Gorduufest out in the orchard. I was rather afraid I’d scare them off, but I joined them anyway with a jug of hard cider to liven the night for us. Another example: Some of the tie-wives are starting to seethe at the way they’re being treated. They work damn hard. Used to be they had a say in what happened to their families. The Agli and his more rabid Followers, they resent and fear women for tempting them from what they see as higher things, and the women are beginning to resent back hard, (He chuckles, then shakes his head.) Though there’s little they can do about it. If they open their mouths to protest even the most outrageous nonsense, even if it’s to protect their children, they’re hauled off to the House of Repentance to be schooled in submission. Repeat the offense and they’re publicly flogged. (His brows come together, he stares down at his hands, sighs.) There are a lot of floggings these days, my friend. Fools. The Followers, I mean. They don’t see that they’re not beating sin out but rebellion in. What else? Ah. Yes. Folk are angry about the defiling of the Maiden Shrines and the treatment of the Keepers. The Keeper in Sadnaji was quite old, she taught most of us our letters and the chants, delivered a good many of the babies the past fifty years. She disappeared after the Guards led her out of the Shrine and took her to the House of Repentance. One rumor is the Agli had her whipped to death. Other rumors say worse. It doesn’t sit well in the bellies of our folk, even some of the Followers. Um. Floarin’s levies are making trouble for her; she’s taken half the men off the tars to fight in that army of hers. A lot of the men don’t want to go, but what can they do? The tithing is another thing. She’s starting to dip into the seed grain. Lot of folk going to starve that shouldn’t need to.

RANE: Any resistance organized?

HAL: Getting there. Tesc Gradin has sent some young-ties down from the mountains to sound things out, his son too, good lad from what I’ve heard. There was some resentment of his attacks on the tithe wagons, but he’s defused this by sending young Teras Gradin around with some of the grain he took and promising more. Rumor says he’s defied the more conservative outcast taroms and brought ties into the governing council of that Haven. When they heard that, my ties got a fire under their skins. There’s a lot of talk about after the war, how things are going to be different. I only get snippets of that, they won t talk much around me, well, can you blame them? And there’s Hern. (The words are a question, there is a hint of a twinkle in Hal’s faded brown eyes.) A clever man, they say. There’s almost as much talk about Hern as there is about Tesc. Though I might just be hearing more of that. There’s a large reservoir of good will for the Heslins. I’ve heard men say he’s a lazy layabout too keen on women, almost fond talk as if they admire his weaknesses as much as his strengths; it’s as if he belongs to them. They tell stories about his skill with a sword and what a fox he is at settling disputes. Funny, a lot of stories I haven’t heard for years are surfacing again. How he got the truth out of twisty Jagger; the time he settled that marriage business at Cantintar; how he led a decset of guards after that rogue band that was burning tars, backed them into a corner and whipped them though they had five times his fighters. (He chuckles.) First time I heard the story, there were only a dozen raiders. Now there’s fifty. By the time Hern returns (he raises a brow, his smiling eyes fix on Rane’s face) he’ll find a space waiting for him no man could possibly fill.

RANE: What about you, Hal? Any danger?

HAL: (shrugging) They’ve tolerated me so far because they see me as an amiable nothing. They’ve taken the tar from me, did you know? Anders is tarom now, good little Follower that he is.

RANE: Does anyone suspect you’re sending information to the Biserica?

HAL: (chuckling) Oh no, my long friend. Sweet Hallam, he’s a harmless fool. Let him potter about grinning at people, he’s entertaining now and then, cools things down sometimes. They burned my books, did you know? Took them all out and put them on a pile. Even the Keeper’s Praises, illuminated by Hanara Pan herself. Anders carried them out with his own hands and put them on the fire. (He broods at the fire, his anger so intense it was palpable; Tuli felt it powerfully.) Barbarians. They’re all barbarians. (His voice is very soft, very even, the words are flat, floating like leaves in the crackling silence.)

RANE: Hal, you don’t have to stay here. This storm will close the pass to wagons, but a man on snowshoes could get through if he had a reason to.

HAL: Oh, I think I must stay. There are still ways I can help my ties. Anders is too thick to notice when he’s being led about by the nose. (He ran a trembling hand through his silverwhite hair.) If by chance I do survive this nonsense, I’d like to live in your guesthouse and work in the Biserica Library. You might mention that to Yael-mri when you see her next.

RANE: (putting her hand over his) I will, be sure of that. Hal?

HAL: What is it, my friend?

RANE: Could you dig into your stores, get us some winter clothing? Blankets (she makes a rueful little sound, bites on her lower lip) and food; meant to get that from you anyway, grain for our macain, they’ll find little enough to eat, groundsheets, a tent, a firestriker, we’ll be sleeping out until we hit Sel-ma-Carth. It’s a lot to ask.

HAL: A lot, but not too much. It’s late. Anders and his soulmate will be sleeping the sleep of the self-justified. The attics will be dusty but deserted. Come with me. (He nods at Tuli.) The youngling should stay here. You know the bolt holes if we run into trouble. By the way, I’ve never gotten round to telling Anders about the little secrets in the walls so you needn’t fear he’ll be poking around down here. If it’s still snowing tomorrow you’d better stay. That won’t be a problem. (He gets to his feet, stretches, pats a yawn.)

Rane unfolded from the pillows, stood looking down at Tuli. “Eh-Moth,” she said. “Kick some of that straw together and stretch out between those quilts. You’re pinching yourself to keep awake.”

Tuli yawned. She nodded, got shakily to her feet. Yawned again.

Rane chuckled. “We won’t be leaving until tomorrow night at the earliest. Sleep as much as you need.”

They stayed in the secret cellar for three days while the storm raged outside. Tuli grew heartily bored with the place. This wasn’t what she’d expected, wasn’t the kind of adventure the old lays sang of.

She and Rane worked over the gleanings from Hallam’s attic, got them sorted into packs for each of the macain, then cut up old worn blankets and sewed them into coats for the macain-no time to let them finish their winter changes. Tuli spent a good part of her days scrubbing a stiff-bristled brush across the itching thickening skins of the beasts, raking away the dead slough. What should have taken a month or two was being pushed into a few days and the good-natured macain were miserable and snappish. The brushing helped. And it kept her temper more equitable, gave her something to do with the long empty hours.

Though Hal seldom visited them during the day, he would come strolling in late at night, usually after Tuli had crawled into her quilts and slid into sleep. Sometimes she woke and saw the two of them head to head by the dying fire, talking in low tones, always talking, more of what she heard the first night. She didn’t bother listening, it was all too boring. She’d enjoyed hearing about her father and Teras, had glowed with pride when Hal praised them, the rest of it seemed a waste of time.

She didn’t quite know what to make of Hallam. He wasn’t like her father, or her uncles, or even old Hars. He seemed a lazy man; too indolent to tend to anything but his own needs, drifting indifferently along as the Agli and the Followers took away everything he had. When she thought about it, though, she saw he was defeating them in his own way by not letting them change him. If they caught him spying, he’d go to his death mildly appreciating the absurdity of what both he and his murderers were doing. Gentle, shambling, incompetent in so many things, he was right, he had no place in the world that was coming. She liked him well enough, but she was glad she didn’t have to live around him, could even understand why Anders had done his best to be as different as he could from his father.

It was easy to let her mind wander as she scrubbed at the macai’s back, scraping loose the fragments of dead skin. Might meet up with Teras as Rane and she wandered about the Plain. She felt a sudden pang of loneliness. She missed Teras more than she wanted to think about, wished he was here, now; it would be so good to have him along, sharing all this, she’d have someone her own age to talk to. She began to see what Rane meant when she said Tuli was too young to interest her any way but as a friend and daughter. Rane was about Annic’s age. Tuli thought about her parents up in the mountain gorge, wondered how they were coping with the snow and the cold. It was interesting to hear from Hallam that her father had got the ties onto the council in spite of the Tallins, seemed things were getting settled in odd ways up there, but settled for sure and in the way her father wanted. Teras and old Hars shuttling messages back and forth between the tars and the gorge. What would Sanani be doing with her oadats, how would she keep them from freezing? Seems like a hundred years since I saw Da and Mama and Sanani. The Ammu Rin, she said it took ten years to be a healwoman. I don’t know if I could take that. I think I’d like being a healwoman. The two men she’d killed, she dreamed about them sometimes, though she didn’t want to. They’d almost forced her to kill them, but they wouldn’t get out of her head. If I can’t be a healwoman, I could always work in the fields; I wouldn’t mind that, I like making things grow, or maybe the Pria Melit would let me help with the animals. She shivered as she heard again the soft whirr of the sling, the faint thunk the stone made against the temple, saw again the guard crumpling with loose slow finality, saw the young acolyte swing round and stretch out on the ground, felt against her palms the empty flaccidity of his legs as she helped carry him to the fire, saw the grime on his feet, the crack in the nail of a big toe, his shaven head, the round ears like jug handles sticking out from his head. She scrubbed at burning eyes with the back of her hand. I won’t cry, not for them, they asked for it. She sniffed again, swallowed, and scrubbed fiercely at the macai’s back.

Late on the third night, Rane woke Tuli. “Wind’s gone down,” she said as Tuli rubbed sleep from her eyes. “Some snow still falling, but that’s just as well, it’ll cover our tracks when we leave here.” Tuli crawled out of the quilts and started putting on her winter gear.

Carrying a lantern Rane walked ahead of her, plowing through the drifts, vanishing repeatedly in the swirls of gently falling snow. There was no wind but tiny flakes kept drifting down and down, with the persistence of water wearing away stone. Hal followed with another lantern, leading the two macain and leaving behind him a wallow a blind man could follow, but when Tuli looked back, she could see that the snow was already filling it. By morning there would be no sign anyone had ever passed this way.

Tuli plodded along between the two lights; in spite of her heavier clothing she was beginning to shiver. So much snow. There ought to be more sound with that much falling, but there was only the crunching of all their feet, a hoot from a macai, the soft hiss from the lanterns.

Rane stopped outside the gate, took the lead rope from Hallam and gave him her lantern. “You can get back all right?”

“I’m not in my dotage, woman. Have a care, will you. Who have I to talk to if you get yourself killed? And give my best to Yael-mri when you see her again.”

Rane watched him disappear into the veils of falling snow; when he was gone, she pulled herself into the saddle, waited until Tuli was mounted, then started east along the lane. The rope tied between them tugged Tuli’s macai into a slow dance, crunching through the drifted snow. She slumped in the saddle, tucked her gloved hands into her sleeves and, half-dozing, followed the shapeless blot in the darkness ahead of her.

Night Camp

Silence between the woman and the girl.

The snow had stopped falling about an hour before they made camp. In the small clearing it came nearly to Tuli’s knees, under the trees it was about half that, where the wind blew the drifts were almost to her shoulders. Using Hal’s shovels they dug away the snow between two trees and put up the tent, dug out another space for the fire and a place to sit by it, fried some bread, made a stew and some cha for supper, the hot food a warm comforting weight in their bellies. Now they sit on piles of brush by the fire, sipping at the last of the cha. Rane is staring at the coals, her reddened, chapped hands wrapped about a mug. Her face is drawn and unhappy. Tuli watches her, wondering if she is grieving again for her dead lover or worried about Hallam or even looking with despair at the future she sees for the mijloc.

Tuli watches the fire in between the times she stares at Rane. §he thinks about Teras. About her father. She sees their faces looking at her from the coals. Ties on the council, she thinks, and wonders how she feels about that. She has never been comfortable with ties. We share a shape, but that’s all, she thinks. She can’t follow their jokes and when they laugh, more often than not she feels that she is the butt of their jokes. Even when she finds out this is not true, the feeling still lingers and doesn’t help her like or deal well with them.

She looks at Rane, wonders if she should say something, but has a feeling it would be an intrusion into places she has no business poking into, so she says nothing.

Still not speaking, Rane stands, kicks snow over the coals, gathers up the supper things she and Tuli have already cleaned and piles them before the tent. She waits for Tuli to crawl inside, wriggles in after her. They share the blankets and the quilts, sleeping side by, side in their clothes, their boots under the blankets with them so they’ll be wearable in the morning. There are some awkward moments at first, working out wrinkles in the covers, finding a comfortable way to share the narrow shelter of the tent. Rane sleeps almost immediately, but Tuli stays awake for some time, listening to the ex-meie breathing. The feel of the lanky strong body pressing against hers disturbs her in ways that remind her too much of what Fayd had done to her not so long ago. She is growing up in her head, that doesn’t bother her, in fact she’s rather pleased by it, a lot of the confusion is clearing away, though more mysteries are still appearing. But she is gaining confidence in her ability to deal with those. What worries her is growing up in her body. The rages she gets are beginning to be more manageable, it is as her mother said, she is growing out of them, but there are other things, things she doesn’t want to feel. It isn’t just the menses, she never has much trouble with those, not like other girls, they are just a mess she hates having to deal with. Sometimes she is so restless she can’t stand herself, sometimes she can’t stand anyone else either, she isn’t mad at them; she just doesn’t want anyone around her, especially boys. Not Teras, he is different, he doesn’t make her feel funny. She wishes he were here now, it would be a lark, they could race with each other, hunt lappets with their slings, maybe spy on people as they did before. Was a time they worked together so well, they didn’t even have to talk much. But that is gone. Teras isn’t that way anymore. He’s changed. Well, that isn’t quite right. He acts like she’s the one changed. Rane can be fun, but she needs to explain things to Tuli and Tuli needs to ask questions and have things explained to her. That is interesting sometimes, learning about people and places and other ways, but Rane is so much older she sometimes forgets how it is to be young and not sure of anything and too proud to ask. Tuli begins to feel depressed, but she is very tired, even the turmoil working in belly and brain has to retire before the waves of exhaustion that roll over her. She sleeps.