Wolf's Blood (5 page)

Urgana might have expected them to question this idea that rocks could hold life, but Derian and Firekeeper had seen too much to doubt. They’d even seen something that might be called living rock, but neither of them said anything for fear they would divert Urgana from her explanation.

“Ellabrana’s power did not extend to the type of spellcasting Ynamynet can do. It was more in the line of a talent. Some of the Once Dead pressed her to try and learn more, but Ellabrana resisted, saying she had no sense for spells. We never discussed it, but I have wondered if, like me, Ellabrana felt guilty over what we had become.”

“So Ellabrana was Once Dead, but she was not part of the ruling power structure?” Derian said.

“That’s right. She took her turn guarding the gates. I think she loved them in a strange way. Otherwise, she devoted her energies to helping restore the ruined buildings here. The ones who had lived here before us—the ones who had shut down the facility when they realized they were in danger of being stranded when the last one who could work the gate spells died—they closed and locked many of the buildings, but even so, the weather found its way inside. Many of the structures remained sound outside, but inside the shell, ceilings had collapsed, walls had crumpled. Ellabrana could often tell if a floor was safe to walk upon or whether the supporting pillars were damaged. Things like that …”

Urgana paused and wiped a tear from the corner of one eye without seeming to notice.

“Later, when rebuilding began. Ellabrana did a great deal. She could convince mortar to dry more evenly or seal a crack in a foundation stone. Her handiwork is all around us.”

“And you?” Firekeeper asked. “Did you build, too?”

Urgana began to shake her head, then nodded.

“I did some building, but the Once Dead who ruled—let me call them the Spell Wielders, as they did themselves, marking themselves out as special even among the Once Dead—the Spell Wielders made plain that they accepted me here on sufferance. If I did not make myself useful, then they would make me useful, and for them, the greatest use to which any of the non-magical could be turned was as a source of blood for their disgusting spells.”

Firekeeper felt her lips drawn back from her teeth in a snarl of revulsion. Beside her, Blind Seer shook with a belly-deep growl.

Urgana did not need to be told the reaction was not directed toward her. She even relaxed as she had not since she had admitted her perceived guilt in helping discover the function of the Nexus Islands.

“So I made myself of use,” Urgana continued, “even though the use they had for me was disgusting to me.”

Derian frowned. “They didn’t …”

Urgana reached out and gave his hand a motherly pat. “It’s not what you’re thinking, young man, although I won’t say that I didn’t deal with that, as well, especially when I was younger and more attractive. No, what they wanted from me was my skills as a researcher. By this time, I could read half a dozen languages, and make my way fairly well in several more. I’ve rather quickly glossed over just how many years of research and experimentation went on before we opened that very first gate, but I was a young woman when we started, and seeing grey in my hair before I first stepped on the Nexus Islands.”

“Is research so bad?” Firekeeper asked.

The wolf-woman thought she knew what Urgana meant, but also knew that she could ask such questions and not be thought stupid. No one was ever quite sure just how much of human culture and motivations she understood. There were times, indeed, that Firekeeper knew Blind Seer was more sophisticated in his comprehension than she was.

Urgana shook her head. “Child, research in itself is not wrong, but when you know as I did that the research will be turned to destruction or exploitation of the weak, then there is no joy in the work. Perhaps if I had believed, as some of the Spell Wielders truly did, that the world would be improved with a return to the old ways. then I might have gone about my work with a lighter heart, but I knew that what I did was in defiance of Divine Retribution, that I was working against the will of the deities. I will not deny that there were times I thought of ending my life, but then Ellabrana would have felt guilty, and by the time Ellabrana had gone to the Divine Five, my sensibilities had been dulled.”

“So you will not help us,” Firekeeper said. “not even when I tell you that we have no wish to conquest or fight. All we wish to know is where querinalo came from.”

“Querinalo came from the deities.” Urgana said firmly. “That is all I know, and all I need to know. If I had remembered this when I was a brash young woman, then perhaps today I would not be a lonely old woman making my home on an island whose purpose I doubt and despise—but which is my home because I have no other.”

THEY LEFT URGANA shortly thereafter and retired to Derian’s house near the stable. The morning had become afternoon, and a patio that took advantage of the pale spring sunlight was comfortable enough for them all to take their meal out-of-doors. There they were joined by Eshinarvash, the Wise Horse, who resided in the stable because he found it comfortable, but on whose stall door there was no lock or latch.

Eshinarvash was a glorious animal. Even Firekeeper, who thought wolves the most beautiful creatures ever to grace the earth, agreed with this assessment. Eshinarvash was what the Liglim called a “paint.” black upon white, or perhaps white upon black, the contrast in wild splashes that made even his mane and tail parti-colored.

Eshinarvash, along with the jaguar Truth, had been among the very few Wise Beasts who had chosen to take up something like a permanent residence on the Nexus Islands. No one knew why Truth had stayed, because Truth was. if anything, harder to understand than ever before. No one doubted that Eshinarvash had stayed as comfort and companion to Derian.

Over the meal, they had related their failure with Urgana to Eshinarvash, and now the Wise Horse responded. It was an odd conversation in a way. for Firekeeper was accustomed to the need to translate for Derian when the Beasts spoke, but when Eshinarvash spoke there was no such need.

“Urgana and I are of the same religion, although there are differences between the way the New and Old Worlds follow the Divine Will. Our deities are kind deities, I think, at least in contrast to some of the tales I have heard the Old World residents relate. However, perhaps because the deities have given us so many omens by which to guide our decisions, our tradition holds that they are less than tolerant of defiance.”

Firekeeper thought fleetingly of the Meddler, of whom Harjeedian the aridisdu could not speak without horror—and this when the Meddler had been so helpful … well, at least helpful at times.

Blind Seer said,
“Eshinarvash, do you believe that querinalo—what my people called the Fire Plague, what the people of New Kelvin called the ‘Burning Time’—do you believe that it is indeed as the Liglim term it ‘divine retribution’?”

“Do I believe querinalo is indeed ‘divine retribution’?” Eshinarvash said, phrasing his reply so that Derian would know a question had been asked. “Blind Seer, that is a question for an aridisdu, not for a simple worshipper like myself.”

“
Still, I would hear your answer
,” Blind Seer persisted. “
Harjeedian is the only aridisdu here, and he is too aware of his position for me to fully trust his answer.
”

“Indeed, Harjeedian is all of u-Liall in himself,” Eshinarvash said, referring to the five-person governing body of Liglim with a snort of laughter. “Such a role might shape the ruling of a less self-important individual than Harjeedian. Very well. I will give you what answer I have arrived at for myself.

“Did the deities send Divine Retribution down upon us as the tales tell? Certainly there is a part of me that wishes to believe this is so. Remember, according to how the tale is told in the New World, Divine Retribution was a direct result of how the Old World sorcerers abused the Wise Beasts, the yarimaimalom.

“However, there is a part of me—and you wolves will understand this, being of a pack, as I am of a herd—that is uncomfortable with the idea that the deities might reach out and punish all the herd, guilty and not, for the transgressions of a few. True, querinalo strikes only those who have magical ability, but as Urgana’s experience shows, the blow strikes even those who are without talent. I did not experience querinalo, but I watched over those who did, and I saw the suffering that came with it—and I know the suffering I experienced for not being able to help those I cared about.

“When I think of this, then I find myself wondering if the deities did create querinalo and set it to gallop among us. Truly it saved the New World, but it ruined the Old World. To believe that the deities would destroy one set of worshippers to save another makes me uncomfortable. Moreover, querinalo did not only touch those who follow our creed. It killed many who had never given their wills to the guidance of the deities.”

“So is it their retribution or not?”
Blind Seer pressed.

“I do not know if querinalo is divine retribution as such,” Eshinarvash said. “I do know that when it appeared, the deities did not stop its spread, nor did they give omens that indicated we should do so. If they did not create it to punish the wrongdoers, well, then, they certainly did not provide guidance on how to stop it. Therefore, if querinalo is not their retribution, perhaps it is their will.”

Blind Seer grumbled something, and cracked down so hard on the bone he had been chewing that it broke in two.

“I had hoped,”
the wolf said
, “that in your explanation I would find something we could use to turn Urgana to our way of thinking. There may be other ways to learn what we need. There are many here who may have tales, and Ynamynet has promised to ask among them, but there is no doubt that Urgana with her ability to read so many languages, and to find trails where Firekeeper and I would only smell dry paper, would have been useful.”

Firekeeper felt that if she had proper ears, they would have pricked in excitement as a new course of action came to her.

“The answer may be here nonetheless. Let us talk with Harjeedian. He is an aridisdu, and Urgana regularly goes to him for counsel. If we can convince him of the rightness of what we would do, then perhaps he can convince Urgana.”

“And if his thinking is as confused as mine?” Eshinarvash asked.

“Then there are omens,” Firekeeper said. “Truth is a great seer, and if she saw omens indicating that the deities might favor our hunt, then surely Harjeedian and Urgana would obey.”

“Truth is honest in those omens she gives,”
Blind Seer warned.
“Since she wrestled Amhyn—or believes she did—when querinalo seized her, she is more devout than ever. What if her omens are not what we wish?”

Firekeeper shrugged. “Then we are no worse off than we are now, and may need to hunt stories more slowly.”

She leapt to her feet, feeling her body one clean line of purpose. “Harjeedian will be at the gates at this time. I saw him there earlier, and the watch runs until dusk. Let’s go find him, and maybe with him we will find Truth.”

III

  “BLOCKED? I FEAR I do not understand.”

The words were spoken politely, but the speaker put into his tone that which made quite clear that “fear” was not his dominant emotion. Irritation sizzling on the verge of explosive anger was closer to what the young man sitting in the chair at the end of the high table projected, as well he knew.

Although Bryessidan, King of the Mires, was not much past twenty-five, already his temper had graven deep lines between his eyebrows. The edges of his mouth bore deep creases from pressing his lips tightly shut over his immediate response. The lines gave a fierce character to features that were otherwise not particularly remarkable. Bryessidan shared the same slight build, brown hair, long brown eyes, and golden brown skin that set the majority of the Mires’ dwellers apart from the other residents of the continent-spanning realm once known as Pelland. Without his regalia—and his distinctive royal glower—Bryessidan could have blended into any crowd.

Even though Bryessidan had long ago learned that acting as prompted by his temper was not the best response to most situations, still he felt that keeping the reminder that he might do so visibly present was a wise tactic.

Certainly, being known for a short temper was better than revealing the insecurity that lay under the king’s surface confidence. A king might be many things, but insecure was not one of these. An insecure king was a weak king, and a weak king was soon a king in name only—and often not even that.

Bryessidan had inherited his throne from his father, who had, in turn, inherited it from his own father, who had—quite frankly—stolen it. The man from whom Grandfather had stolen the throne on which Bryessidan now sat had made the mistake of being insecure. He had confided a great many things to a very few people, and one of those people had … well, what was reported to have been done varied with the point of view of the one who told the tale.