Stonewiser (38 page)

Sariah couldn't stand it any longer. “I know you don't have to speak to me in the Wisdom. You talked to me at the dome.”

“Wise is he who speaks what has been wisely spoken before him, for his wisdom cannot be doubted.”

“That's Tirsis again.”

“Who needs the burden of a voice when all has been properly said?”

“The teacher, Eneis. He asks questions all the time. But I don't want to speak to the sages. I want to speak to you.”

The man made a big effort, as if his mind had forgotten how to translate independent thought into word. His mouth curled in disgust, but he finally spoke his own words. “Why speak to me when you can speak to the sages?”

“Because the sages are gone and dead. Because they can't tell me what I need to know. Don't you want to speak for yourself?”

“There is no wisdom greater than the Wisdom.”

“I don't have time for this.”

The man's claws popped out of his right hand.

“What are you doing?”

The blade froze against the keeper's forearm. “Do you want me to speak without the Wisdom? Fine. I do. I trespass. I cut myself.”

“No, nay, no.” Sariah was horrified. “I want neither your pain nor your blood.”

“You want my words but not my blood?” He stared at her as if she was both crazy and dumb.

“You. Your people. Do you cut yourselves every time you don't speak the Wisdom?”

He nodded.

“Meliahs spare us. I just want to speak to you. Without bloodshed. Can you do that?”

The man's Adam's apple bobbed helplessly up and down his throat. “Only if you command me to do so.”

“You would heed my command?”

“I'm your keeper now.”

“Oh, no.” She wasn't falling for it again. “I'm not your pet or anything like it. And you're not mine.”

“Pet?” The man considered her dubiously. “Of course you're not my pet or I yours. But you can command me as you wish.”

Strange. One moment she had been fighting the man on the bloody pedestal and now he wanted to obey her? “I really don't want to command you. I just want to talk to you.”

“Now that the sages have found you true, you can do as you want.”

“And you won't cut yourself?”

“It's a strange command to follow, but if you want, I won't cut myself when I speak to you.”

“And you won't make me drink your blood again?”

His eyes flashed with fury. “Do you find my blood unworthy?”

There was much more to the blood drinking than she knew. “I just don't
like
blood.”

“You don't like blood?” His brows clashed in complete incredulity.

Was that so hard to believe?

“Perhaps you find my blood unimpressive.”

“Unimpressive?” Sariah was lost. “You don't need to impress me. Your claws did that.”

“You won the fight.”

“Oh, that. It only happened because I thought I was going to die. Otherwise, I'm sort of clumsy with the blade.”

“I thought so.” A flash of teeth broke right beneath his nose's audacious septum. “But you didn't have to tell me. You're unexpectedly unassuming.”

“Sorry to disappoint, but I'm in a hurry. I need answers and I need to rejoin my friends.”

“They've made such a ruckus at the cliffs.”

A measure of relief washed over Sariah. If Kael and the others were able to make a ruckus at the cliffs, then they were alive and in good condition. Just to make sure, she asked.

“You haven't hurt them, have you?”

“Not much.”

“I must see to them.” Sariah shook off the woman's attentions and stood up.

“The body's healing precedes the mind's peace,”
the woman said.

“Meek shall be the dragon at the foot of the stone,”
the keeper replied.

“Fierceness in all things,”
the woman spat.
“Killing
AND caring—”

These two were fighting. With the Wisdom's words. Incredible.

Sariah spoke to the woman. “Thank you, but I don't need your services anymore.”

The woman glowered at the keeper before she left the room.

“I want to see my friends,” Sariah said.

“You can't leave,” the keeper said.

“Am I your prisoner?”

The man's eyes widened in surprise. “Of course not, but there's much you must yet see.”

“I've got a people to find. I've got a beam to follow, and very little time. And I won't abandon my friends to the Shield or to your monsters down there.” It all came out a bit more blustery than she meant.

“Peace, stonewiser. Perhaps I can help.”

“How?”

“Given the circumstances, I can try to persuade the sages to admit your friends into our lands without a lien of conversion.”

“A lien of conversion? What is that?”

“It's the customary way of admitting outsiders. A way must exist to turn treason into faith if one of Meliahs’ defectors is brought up the cliffs.”

“Are we talking about Goodlanders who want to come here?”

“Defectors never seek the truth on their own.”

“Let me see if I understand this lien of conversion. You abduct people from the Goodlands, bring them up here against their will and make them your slaves?”

“Only until they have learned and accepted the Wisdom.”

No wonder people were scared of Meliahs’ Hounds. “And what happens if one of these defectors wants to return to the Goodlands? What happens if they're just dumb and cannot learn a lick of the Wisdom?”

“We kill them, of course. There's no value to a life without the Wisdom. But don't worry. Their souls are not forfeited. We drink their blood, even if it's bitter, and we commit their remains on hallowed land as is proper and fitting.”

Mara's terrifying abduction tales made perfect sense to Sariah now. So did the thousands of earthenware vessels she and Delis had seen at the foot of the Bastions.

“Why do you bring these defectors up the Bastions in the first place?”

“In obedience to the Wisdom.
Be fruitful and multiply,
commands Vargas,
for we must be prepared to inflict the blow with honed claws for every hand. We must turn the soul to flesh and the flesh to stone until they're one and the same.”

This was a culture of war, blood, violence, zealousness. “This conversion lien, does it apply to me?”

“Of course not.”

“But I don't know the Wisdom. Am I a defector too?”

“You survived the dome. The Wisdom is in your heart.”

“Can you assure me that my friends won't be submitted to a lien of conversion or anything like it?”

“Not unless you wish it.”

“Why would I wish it?”

“For a friend who's perhaps not such a good friend?” The keeper smiled. “I'll help with your friends.”

“Why would you do that?”

“I'm your keeper. It's my job.”

“I don't need a keeper.”

“You do.”

“Is this a trick? I don't like tricks. Will there be another keeper tomorrow?”

“For someone else, perhaps, but for you, it will be me tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow.”

“Do you have a name?”

“I'm Jol.”

“Why you, Jol?”

“It was me the day you came and it was my blood you licked.”

She gagged. She could almost taste it in her mouth.

“You'll need to set off the beam again.”

She was instantly suspicious. “Why?”

“Only you can do it.”

“What do you mean only I can do it?”

“You've been dreamed,” the keeper said.
“The beam shall only answer to the call of the branded beast.”

Sariah felt as if she had been smacked on the face. It wasn't the stone she placed on the checkered cloth board which acted as a safeguard to trigger the wising in Leandro's game. It was she, or more to the point, the brand stamped on her hands and on her core that released the game to call the beam. She had been shallow in her appraisal, overly confident and yes, even cocky. A complex wising required complex answers, not cheap wising tricks.

Sariah scolded herself. Mistakes were dangerous. Mistakes cost lives. To think she had felt accomplished when she thought she had cracked the wising in Leandro's game. Instead, the wising had cracked her. The snakes and scorpions were wised to somehow recognize Zeminaya's seal. That's why she was able to call the beam. That's why no one else who played the game—wittingly or unwittingly—could trigger the wising.

“That's why you are important,” the keeper said. “Besides, how else will you know where the beam leads you unless you call it?”

The man was right. Sariah had to overcome her bewilderment and think clearly. She wouldn't underestimate the stones again. She had to get her new bearings, and as long as these people went along, it would be safer to do it from behind the Bastions’ protection. At least now she had a new bargaining tool. She was the only one here who could call the beam.

“Fetch my friends and I'll call the beam.”

“I'll go meet with the sages now and return with news.” He stopped at the bottom of the ladder. “Be at ease, wiser. It will all happen as foretold.”

“Foretold?”

The keeper was gone and she was alone with her questions.

Decisions were made slowly in the land of Meliahs’ Hounds. That's how Sariah had begun to think of the people who lived beyond the Bastions, fierce in resolve and stubborn by nature. They shared that notable trait with their Domainer cousins. Although they had split from the whole of the Blood before the execration, they also shared something else with the Domainers—the intensity of a fateful purpose.

She understood the Domainers’ oath, the pledge to return to the stone through building new land. But despite the abundance of blustery and readily available Wisdom, the Hounds’ purpose was still a mystery to her.

The keeper arrived as he had done every afternoon, bowing before her reverently, offering a greeting and a smile but no news. Again.

Sariah prayed for patience. She feared if she called the beam without securing her friends first, she would be putting their lives at risk. On the other hand, every day that passed was wasted time. She felt like screaming at the keeper. Instead, she spoke calmly.

“It has been a fortnight since I arrived. Why can't we fetch my friends today?”

“We must have the sages’ approval.” The keeper made a sweeping gesture toward the ladder.
“Walking is like dreaming, Poe says. It calms the soul and quiets the heart's protests.”

Sariah didn't think she could appease the urgency in her soul, but she got her mantle and followed the keeper up the ladder. She had been doing a lot of pacing in the confines of her small apartment. She might as well catch some fresh air while she was at it.

The sting in the air reminded her that the chill had arrived. The sheer number of people going about the settlement amazed her. The rooftops were even more crowded this afternoon. Perhaps it was market day. Open fires and countless tents stood beyond the mud brick walls and steady caravans of newcomers peopled the roads. Never before had she seen so many assembled in one place.

Sariah pointed to a slow-moving line of shackled men carrying bundles on their backs. “Are they…?”

“Defectors.”

As long as it dwelt deep in the human heart, slavery had a way of working itself into every culture.

The sun rode weak and low on the horizon, on account of the newly arrived chill. The sight of the yellow orb flaming between the settlement's tall domes took Sariah's breath away.

“Beautiful, yes?” the keeper said.
“Three domes dazzle the eyes at the waiting—one for the coming, one for the going and one to signal the end of the time.”

“Poe?”

“Very good.”

“It's a good thing, then. Only two domes stand.”

“What's good but what we know? What's evil but what we don't know?”

“Eneis.” Sariah faced the keeper. “I'm not here to learn the Wisdom.”

“Are you not happy among us? Is your bed not firm enough? Is your food not plentiful and your fire hot?”

She was comfortable, as comfortable as she had been in months, no, in her entire life. She had food, warmth and comforts aplenty. She was safe from the Shield and the Guild, surrounded by people who treated her with kindness and deference akin to devotion. She had her own set of rooms with a crackling hearth that burned day and night, a huge luxury when compared to her life at the Guild, her journey's hardships, or even her Domainer deck. She had servants, for Meliahs’ sake. Servants. People who tended to her every need with single-minded determination despite her vociferous protests.

No one in their right mind would deny themselves the reprieve and resign from such comforts. Except her, of course. She had good reasons. Not only were her dearest friends cold and hungry, exposed to the Shield's dangers in the forest, but she had a people to find and her stone pledge to fulfill.

“I'm not fated for comfort, keeper. I have very little time to do as I must. I need my friends and my freedom.”

“You need much more,” the keeper said. “I've been trying every day.”

“Yet nothing happens.”

“Double the domes and triple the sages shall grant the approval—”