Heir of Scars I: Parts 1-8 (44 page)

Adria did not feel comfortable moving close enough to hear them. It did not seem her place. Instead, she helped some of the young women make bread — Imani, Adria was relieved to see, was among them, and hovered around Adria, chatting rapidly in Aesidhe, gingerly testing the bandage on her wounded chest.

Even as they ate, many among the tribe remained obviously shocked and overwhelmed. The elders sat in a group, talking quietly as they ate. Most of the tribe was silent, and Adria could see, from their faces, from their lack of voice, and from the methodical motions, that the Aesidhe were slow to reconcile what had happened.

Separate from the rest, Preinon and the Runners ate quickly and distractedly, and it was clear that they were still working to secure the camp and determine what had happened. From a distance, Adria tried to surmise what was happening, what her uncle’s words and motions might mean. She realized, then, that something had subtly changed.

He has taken command,
Adria realized.
He gives orders to Runners and Hunters, and without consulting the elders
.

Preinon had prisoners brought forth, green-faced Shíme Hoshegi Bobeya, and they were unbound and given food. They ate in silence, with expressions that Adria could not read, either because of their distance or self control, or their painted faces.

Preinon and several of the others ate in a ring around them, at a little distance. Most of the prisoners had been wounded and bandaged. Adria had helped tend to them herself.

Traitors wounded by us, and then healed by us.
She thought.
Who decides who dies, then? Who decides, even, to whose tribe we belong?

She wished, for a moment, that she could walk time backwards and return to Tabashi — for time to suspend as it had in the attack — and to ask him the perfect questions, all her questions, instead of drawing her blade. And she would walk backwards further, to the attack itself. With just a little more of whatever had happened, she would make all the arrows pause in mid-flight. She might have walked among them, could have snatched them out of the air and broken them before they found flesh.

But this is nonsense. 
Adria blinked away the vision, and with it, tears of anger. 
I dream. I am exhausted, full of fever even. I have been wounded, and that can never change. Time moves as it will. The rest is fantasy…

As soon as the meal was finished, at the time where an elder might have initiated a story or a song, Preinon rose and stood beside the fire and the prisoners, and it seemed to Adria that his shadow fell upon them all. He motioned to the nearest Runners, and spoke in Aesidhe. Four of them left, in separate directions, to return in moments with many of the other Runners.

Preinon motioned to the prisoners, and they lined up before him, sitting upon their legs, shoulders hunched and heads bowed in recognition of defeat.

Still, they sit within striking distance,
 Adria could see. 
If they moved as one, they could push Preinon into the fire.

The Runners and the Hunters of the tribe slowly gathered around them, sitting as well, and much of the rest of the tribe followed, or moved within range of hearing.

Adria sensed a presence in the corner of her vision, and saw that Shísha stood beside her.

“Will you sit with me, Lichushegi?” Adria asked.

Shísha watched — or seemed to watch — the scene before them, without emotion, and she nodded slowly. “Yes,” she breathed, sitting easily for someone without sight, and after what must have been a long time with little or no sleep and with significant exertion. “Yes. I think you will need to hear the meaning of his words.”

Adria nodded. “Thank you… it’s a very good thing that you and the Runners…” and only then did Adria realize that the fact that Shísha and Preinon and Mateko and the rest were even there was not only fortunate but even unusual. In all the strangeness of what had occurred, she had not considered or asked. She framed her question for Shísha, but then her uncle began to speak.

Shísha translated every word swiftly, only occasionally hesitating to produce the correct Aeman phrase. Preinon spoke loudly enough for all to hear, even as he motioned to the prisoners before him, a sign Adria knew to be a welcome.

“Today we are all blood brothers. Today you will listen to me, in trade for the blood you have spilled and the blood you have shared,” he began, eyes on the green-faced traitors, and the tone of command in his voice shook even Adria.

I have never heard him speak like this before.
 Shísha’s voice was more reserved in translation, and devoid of his emotion. 
Is this how she feels, or merely an effect of her translating?

“I begin in apology,” Preinon continued, after a long breath, and his voice broke upon the final word. He was speaking to them all now, and his eyes included all present — the prisoners at his feet, the gathering of Runners, the massed tribespersons, and the elders in their separate circle. “I apologize, because I could have foreseen this attack.”

Unusually, there was silence. No one voiced their agreement, or even disagreement, as was the Aesidhe custom. There were not even nods of encouragement, but Adria could see that this did not surprise Preinon.

Are they so shocked?
Adria thought as she looked around.
Have they lost all sense of themselves, somehow? It is no wonder, perhaps.

“I have been careless, as we have all been careless,” Preinon continued. “We have believed far too much in the goodness of the People, and we have believed too much in the fairness of Others. We have trusted too much even in ourselves, trusted that we cannot ever betray what we understand.”

Oh, 
Adria began to realize. It seems almost as if I can understand him, even without Shí
sha.
 And she realized why, and in part why there were no rejoinders to his speech. 
He speaks in Aesidhe, but as an Aeman. He is using the words of the People, but the manners of speech of the Others. He is both friend and foreigner...

...like me,
 she nodded. 
He is speaking also to me, and with me. That is his apology, even regardless of the words being spoken.

“The People attack the People,” he went on. “This is not new, as those who have lived more than a few seasons know. There has always been war among the People, as there has always been war among the Others. As individuals and as tribes, we have always tested ourselves against each other, made ourselves stronger for the greater survival of us all. We have never slept overlong. I tell you nothing you do not know.

“But today was not a test... today you have not strengthened yourselves, but another. Today, the People are weakened at the greater cost, by the will of the Others, and to strengthen the Others for the day when they turn their hand fully against us. Today, we distrust the People. We distrust those who are not our tribe. We distrust ourselves.”

Another long pause. There was some nodding of heads, and some might have spoken, but for the strength of his stance, the command of his eyes, the set of his jaw.

“I know that the People are afraid, and that the People are hungry,” he continued. “The Others have driven many from their lands. They have stripped and burned hunting grounds. They have pushed us closer together. There is not enough space or food for us all. This is true.

“And… those who have done this to us have also found a solution for us. They will give us gold to destroy one another. With their gold, we can go to their cities. With this gold, we can feed our children. We can buy the food they have stolen from us with their fire and axes.

“And if we destroy half of ourselves, our path will be easier. There will be fewer of the People to feed. Our paths and our trials lead us easily to this end, this final solution that the warriors of the Others would bring us from the voices of the women they would call Holy.”

Shísha stumbled over the word “Holy,” but Adria could tell that the tone itself brought the word into question.

Preinon continued. “Mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, I say to you now, by their beloved gold and by their nameless god and by their sharpest blade, they come to destroy us with one hand while the other offers us bread.”

Us, 
Adria blinked. 
He is of the People now.

And here is where his voice came into its stride. He quickened the pace of his words, and shortened the pauses, and Shísha strained to keep up her pace.

“The Aeman would turn us against ourselves,” and Preinon paced between the fire and green faces. “Even as they have long turned against their own wherever they found some small gain. They would make us spill the blood of our brothers. They would take the land and give us gold in return, and this shining gold will blind us to all else. And when we grow so blind, they will take back this gold for themselves again, and keep the land closed, behind walls of fallen forests and lines of ash.”

Voices and hands rose in agreement with each phrase now, from the Runners and warriors alike, and even among the prisoners.

There are tears on their faces,
Adria nodded. Green paint glistened and smeared.

“They will bring us all to ruin, for they have no love, and they have no Holiness and no memory. They forget past promises as they forget friends, as they forget even those who bore them, beyond the living generations. They look to a father and a mother, and they ask, ‘what can you give to me?’ They look to a brother and a sister and they ask, ‘what can I take from you?’ They look to all those they might love and they ask, ‘what can I gain if you are destroyed?’”

His anger shone upon his face, whenever it turned away from the shadow cast from the fire. His body tensed, his voice raged. There were rejoinders now, slowly and few at first, from the most ardent of the Runners.

“It is true, they will give gifts with one hand closed. They will threaten your land with one, and then offer you gold with another. They will put you in chains, and then offer you freedom. And they will spit you upon their spears and offer you one last prayer for life. They will give you the promises of a god of the future, for they will ruin you here today.”

Now a good deal of those present had joined, though the elders, and most of the women, remained silent. He paused to allow them all to quiet and still. His voice lowered as well, his passion subsided somewhat.

“You know me, one and all, if not by voice or face, then by word and deed.”

He waited for many of the heads to nod, for many of the voices to agree.

“You know that I speak as an Other, as one of a very few who have been among them and who has fled and fought them. You know I am one who would make war against a brother to save him, who has abandoned the walls of timber and of stone and of gold and of ash. You also know me as one who has shown love to those who understand its worth, who has lived as one of the People, who has eaten as one of us, shared as one of us, fought as one of us, and as all my fallen ancestors look on, I will die as one of us.”

He had raised his voice again to a fever pitch.

They are ready to boil.
 Adria watched them, every one of those which held a bow or a spear or a blade for the People. 
They are ready for this.

“Fathers... Mothers... Sisters... Brothers... all the Wisest and the weakest among us... all the bearers of children and the Hunters born, I make you this promise, with every thought and deed that has brought me here: As I live, I will not set foot from this forest until the People are free, until we cross rivers of Aeman blood.”

Many had risen to their feet by now, arms and weapons raised with their voices. Adria’s head felt light, and the anger that had been coiled in her belly since the battle now uncoiled into something like joy, of pride for her uncle’s promise.

Still, the elders remained silent, neither offering voices and motions of support, nor giving disagreement.

Perhaps they are waiting until the voices die down, or the emotions. It will be days before the tribe can fully understand what has happened, and yet... Preinon fans the flames while the ashes still smolder. Does he see what the elders do not, or they what he does not?

Adria shook her head a little, realizing how easily she placed her own thoughts in the head of someone else — Preinon, the elders.

As the voices died down, Preinon motioned again to the Prisoners, but Adria did not know the sign. His voice was calmer again, but still with all its command.

“I know some of you. You know who I am. Take what I have said to your People, and tell them this: That as I am of the blood of those who hunt us, I am of the heart of the hunted. And as surely as I see you live this day, they would have seen you destroyed. You can stand with them, or you can hunt with us, as all your ancestors before you have given you the life and the will to choose...

“But... tell them that our long retreat is over. If you run with us, you run to take back what is ours, to hunt the hunter and to return his walls to dust.”

An ultimatum,
 Adria nodded. 
But who does he speak for? Surely not the People... but... even the Runners?
 Even Adria knew, at this point, that the Aesidhe did not have warlords, did not have kings or princes. Even the elders bore no absolute authority.
Can Preinon claim such a place among them, even merely a band of them?

The spark of joy and pride paled a little.

Tabashi was right
, Adria realized. 
He is still Lord Preinon.

“He would build an army,” Adria whispered, as the green-faced men rose, as they left the circle of fire and the circle of camp, a pair of Runners following a little behind.

“Still it is all he knows to do,” Shísha said, nearly startling Adria, who had at this point almost forgotten her presence, even though she had translated every word.

Adria nodded, turning her head to the Holy Woman. “But… is he wrong?”

Shísha was slow to react, to speak, and Adria somehow wondered even if she deserved an answer — if she could even understand what Shísha might say.