So Hanish did tell them. He had never kept such things from these two, even if he held back certain things when meeting with the Board of Councillors, that new body of prominent Meins that resided, ironically, in Alecia. It disturbed Hanish to note how much of the Acacian way of being they had taken on already. If he could see a way to do it differently he would, but on one and then another topic he found the Acacian template the only reasonable, achievable answer.
Once Hanish had told them everything, Haleeven said, “I hate it that we must bow to the Lothan Aklun. I’ve never even set eyes on one of them. The league may have made them up, for all we know. I’ve said this before, but we should brush the league aside and deal with the Aklun directly, if they exist.”
“I feel the same,” Maeander said, “but it is not for us to argue with the ancestors. They blessed the arrangements we made, and it is they who want to be freed and freed now. Remember that your brother’s voice speaks through them, Haleeven, and our father’s, Hanish.”
Hanish hesitated a moment but evaded the thought that troubled him and kept his composure right through it, enough so that Maeander would not notice the pause for what it was. He said, “I’ll speak with the ancestors tonight. If they agree, we will send word to Tahalian. We will tell them it is time to begin the transport. Haleeven, you will initiate the move.”
“That’s not as we discussed,” Maeander said. “Hanish, come now, you know I should go. You have an empire to rule; I am but a tool to aid you. You cannot possibly expect me to mismanage such an important task! Haleeven will come with me, if that reassures you, but when have we ever failed you?”
“You never have. Not once. It is just that this must be done right, exactly right.”
Maeander put on a look of mock affront.
“What I mean,” Hanish said, “is that we have more than just the move to take care of. We must redouble our efforts to find the Akarans. If they live, we must have them. This is what I need you for, Maeander. You have no other assignment now-just that you find them and bring them here.” He said this with finality, consciously avoiding meeting his brother’s gaze, not wanting to see rebellion in his face. “I should have put you in charge of hunting for them in the first place. For my part, I will make sure that Corinn remains safe, close to me and guarded.”
He moved around his desk, dug a key from his breast pocket, and bent to unlock a drawer. “Uncle, read over these,” he said, hefting a leather case of documents and plopping them on the table. “You will have to see to this exactly. Exactly. Do everything word for word as the early ones tell us. The Tunishnevre has not been moved in twenty generations. If you make an error…”
Haleeven gathered the case and sat down with it. He ran his fingers over the reindeer leather, flipped the simple latch open, and seemed to sit a moment in awe, his nostrils flaring as he inhaled the dry scent of the sheaves. “I will make no errors,” he said. “Thank you for this. The plateau in summer…I have longed to see it again.”
“You will,” Hanish said, smiling, genuinely pleased for the older man. “Perhaps you will even find time for a hunt. The reindeer must be fat by now, lax because you have been away so long. Do the work well, and be revived by it also.” He might have said more, but he felt Maeander’s eyes on him, tugging at him. He turned and looked at him.
“I cannot argue with you, brother,” Maeander said. “If the Akarans live, I’ll find them and drag them to you by their hair. When I do, I trust you will give me the honor of cutting their throats myself.”
CHAPTER
The man who was to accompany the prince found him squatting outside his tent in the predawn darkness. Without speaking, Aliver gathered his few supplies in a goatskin sack and slung it over his back. He tugged the leather cord until the load settled as he liked it to. Other than that he wore only the short woven skirt of a hunter. This journey was to be a hunt of sorts, and he was dressed accordingly, exactly the same as he had been a few weeks ago when he ventured out to find a laryx. He had thought that earlier morning that he had never embarked on a task more dangerous, more important. Now it was almost forgotten.
“You are ready?” Kelis asked. His features were sharp edged in a manner that Aliver had long thought was constant judgment, although lately he had not been as sure that the man’s visage betrayed anything of the thoughts behind it.
“Of course,” Aliver answered.
The other man nodded and moved off. Aliver fell in beside him. He matched his stride and kept tempo with him. They progressed from a walk into an easy jog and then to the light-footed run these southern people were famous for. They moved out of the village, past the last of the shadow mounds of the huts. They rose up to the crest of an incline that, had it been lighter, would have shown before them a rolling stretch of tree-dotted pastureland, roasted to gold by the dry season. They would need to cover more than a hundred miles just to get into territory to begin the hunt. The entirety of this day and more thereafter stretched before Aliver as one of continuous motion. But he had been trained for such feats. Each breath of air brought strength into him. He felt the slap of the earth beneath his bare feet and knew he was suited to this life, this place in the world.
How different he had been when he arrived in Talay. His flight from Kidnaban had been harrowing, but at least he had made it to his goal. He had been dragged by a guardian all the way to the court of Sangae Umae, such as it was. What had he thought was happening to him back then? He barely remembered. He had been angry and scared-he knew that. But mostly he remembered random things, like finding a sand-colored snake in his boot his first morning in the village, back when he still wore boots. It was poisonous, he had learned, deadly. It was one of the reasons Talayans did not wear shoes. He thought about this often, mulling over the fact that he did not wear shoes anymore either, hadn’t in years and could barely imagine doing so again.
He remembered how hard it had been to balance himself above the hole the villagers shat in. Such a simple thing, squatting to release his bowels, but he had hated doing it, hated that he could not seem to wipe himself properly with leaves or stones, as everyone else here did. He remembered watching the boys of the village playing a game that he could make no sense of. There was nothing to it other than that each of them took turns getting smacked with a stout stick. They hit each other hard, their bodies cringing from the blows in obvious pain. But they laughed, taunted one another, and tilted their so-white teeth to the sky in mirth that seemed to have no end.
He remembered the menace he had seen in the lean, black-bodied youths he had trained with. He had been weak compared to them. He lost his breath before they did. They were all hard edges, knobs of thrusting knees and elbows as they wrestled, chins like knives wedged in his back. He remembered the girls of the village, round eyed as they watched him, whispering among themselves, sometimes breaking into peals of laughter more painful to his pride than anything the boys inflicted on him. He remembered how hard it was to pronounce Talayan words correctly. Again and again he had repeated exactly what he believed the other to have said, only to be answered by needling ridicule. There was something feminine in the way he rolled his r’s, something childish in his hard g’s, something of the imbecile in the way he could not master the timing of silences that gave identical phrases vastly different meanings. He remembered how he hated the sand blown on the evening breeze. It dusted his face and tracked his tears, no matter how he tried to wipe and wipe and wipe all traces of them away.
But all of that was years ago. Why even think about it now? Now he was a hunter, a man, a Talayan. He ran beside a warrior whom he cherished as a brother. He breathed steadily and flowed along, mile after mile, a film of sweat coming on to him as the sun rose. Those menacing boys were his companions now; those large-eyed girls were now women who looked upon him favorably, lovers who danced for him, a few who vied to be the first to bear him a child. He spoke the people’s tongue like a native. He did not entirely remember how he had worked this transformation. The fact that he had killed a laryx marked his maturation in the eyes of his community. True enough, he had never been more alive than during that hunt, never more aware of his mortality and his undeniable hunger to survive. And not just to survive, to win glory. But even this was only one episode, with many, many smaller ones to consider also. Who can explain just how he became the person he is? It does not happen this day or that one. It is a gradual evolution that happens largely unheralded. He simply was who he now was.