She stepped away from him and stood watching as he talked rapidly with the others, sending them out to scavenge food, mounts and anything that seemed useful. After a frown at Tuli that told her to stay put, he left. For a while she stood watching the army break apart and wondering what was happening inside the wall, then she settled herself on a bit of withered grass and arranged Ildas comfortably in her lap, and began brooding over her future. Coperic probably expected her to come back to Oras with him, and she was probably going to go. It looked like the best choice-if she could make him keep her and not send her home to her father. She frowned at the wall, thinking about the swarm of girls inside. Maybe she could have grown used to all that if she’d stayed there. What had Tuli-then thought? She tried to remember. It was only what?-two-three passages ago. Too much had happened since. She couldn’t bring that girl back, she was just gone, that was all. And it didn’t matter anyway. She scratched absently along the fireborn’s elastic spine and thought about staying at the Biserica for weapon training. Rane wanted that. The ex-meie wanted Tuli to take over her run, and the idea appealed to her. Trouble was she couldn’t go out right away, she’d have to spend a bunch of years being trained. A great wave of resistance rose in her. All those girls, tie-girls, tar-girls, strangers from all over, she didn’t like them any better now than she had when she was growing up at Gradintar or forced to mix with them up in Haven. The thought of having to live in a herd of them churned her stomach and soured her mouth. She couldn’t do it. Giggling, stupid, supercilious girls. No! Maybe if she went back when she was older. She thought about what she didn’t want. She didn’t want to marry anyone; and she’d probably have to if she went back with her family. She didn’t want to go back and be shut behind house walls like most mijloc women, tar-women anyway, doing the women’s work she despised. She didn’t want to be shut behind Biserica walls either, living by Biserica rules. At least Coperic understood her and accepted her as she was. He could teach her how to support herself, and how to defend herself so no one could tell her what to do. Have to send Da word I’m not coming home. Wherever home is. He’s going to howl. Maybe. She was Tesc’s favorite, she’d known that as long as she’d known anything and had taken careless advantage of it. She scratched behind Ildas’s pointy ear and smiled as he groaned with pleasure. The smile faded as she remembered her father as he was up in Haven, busy, vigorous, happy, absorbed in the problems of governing that forced him to extend himself for the first time in his life. He might be too busy now to bother about her. Tears prickled in her eyes. Impatiently she brushed them away. Silly. Making herself feel bad. Over nothing maybe. If she’d learned anything during the past year, she’d found from painful experience that she wasn’t very good at understanding people or knowing what they were going to do. She shrugged. Didn’t matter. Coperic liked her. That was enough to go on with.
29
Georgia and Anoike were up in the observation room of the west tower, moving about from windowslit to windowslit, watching the power-dance on the mountain peaks, looking out over the army, checking on the vuurvis fire eating at the gates.
Anoike pulled her head in. “Somethin weird happenin over here.”
Georgia turned from the side slit where he was scowling at the fire. “Huh?”
“C’mon here, hon.”
He brushed at the crumbling stone, then leaned out the slit beside hers. “What?”
“Them. There.”
“Mercs. So?”
“Uh-uh.” She lifted her binoculars, looked through them a minute longer, slipped the strap over her head and passed them to Georgia. “Look close, see ’f you see what I see.” She went back to leaning in the slit, ignoring the carbon staining her thin strong arms. When she saw the Kulaan swarm over Kole and the Nor, she gave a low whistle. “Would’ya look at that.”
“When you’re right, you’re right.” He brushed at his arms, handed her the binoculars. “Got your wish, Annie Lee.” He grinned at her scowl. “Someone took out Nekaz Kole.” He sobered. “Better let Hern and Yael-mri know.”
Hern stood very still, his eyes fixed on the crumbled cliff, on the paired trees blowing in a wind that didn’t reach the valley floor. His face and eyes looked blank, rather as if he were unconscious on his feet.
Yael-mri put her hand on his shoulder. “Hern.”
He shuddered, sucked in a long breath, exploded it out, sucked in another. He glanced at the trees one more time, then swung around, his back to them. “What?” The single word was harsh, strained. He cleared his throat, coughed. “What’s happening?”
“The Shawar are loosed. They’re chasing the Sleykynin from the valley.”
Anoike was staring at the upwelling of thick golden light, spreading in slow waves out from the heart of the Biserica. Georgia watched her a moment, then turned to Hern. “Nekaz Kole is dead. Looks like some of the raiders got hold of merc leathers, just walked up to him and stuck a knife in him, pulled him out of the saddle and went off with his rambut.”
Hern closed his eyes. “Then it’s over.” He looked down at himself. “I’d better get dressed. Georgia, collect your councilors. Yael-mri, you get the priestsu together; Where’d be the best place to meet? Not the Watchhall.” He brushed at his face as if trying to brush away memory. “The library, I think, neutral ground of a sort.” He started walking toward the hospital tent and the trucks parked there, talking as he walked, as idea after idea came to him. “Oras will be a rat-pit by now. Won’t take long to tame it, though. Hang a few of the bloodiest rats, keep patrols in the streets a passage or two. Cimpia Plain. That’ll be harder. Food. Have to work out a way to distribute what’s left of the tithing, chase off any bands of majilarni still there, bound to be raiders hitting the tars and the villages. Reminds me, we’ll need someone to talk for the tars and ties, a Stenda and a Keeper, one of those who came in with the last bunch of ’lockers. Suppose I’ll have to stand watch for the others. Your folks can stay here at the Biserica if that’s what you want. Probably should until spring. North of the Catifey the winters are hard on those without shelter. Some should stay at the Plaz in Oras, once we can get that cleaned out, advance party so to speak, it’s close to the land you’ll be getting, got maps there. Have to talk to you about the Bakuur, they have tree-rights to bottom land on both sides of the river. Have to work out some kind of government, I’m not going back to the way it was before, even if…” He stopped walking, paused. Then after a minute he started on, continuing to blurt out whatever came into his mind, not bothering with any but the most rudimentary of connections, talking to hold off the loss that kept threatening to overwhelm him.
The golden light thickened about them and began pouring over the wall onto the army, waking them to defeat, prodding them away from the valley.
30
Julia wedged herself into an embrasure and frowned at the ugly trampled plain below. The grass will be thick and tall next year. So much fertilizer. She moved a shoulder out from the stone, slipped the rifle loose. She’d like to throw it in the muck with the bodies, but likes didn’t seem to count much these days. She felt drained, old, yet oddly open. Open to the life ahead, the challenge of this new world, this newer, fresher community. It seethed with possibilities and hope. Much experience had taught her the fallacy of new beginnings made by the same old people; whatever the starting point, sooner or later the ancient problems showed up. Still, there was always the chance that this time would be different. She set the rifle beside her and looked at her hands. The one thing she wanted most was to get back to her writing, to put the words and ideas churning in her head into physical form where she could play with them, shape them into pleasing rhythms, be surprised by them, by what she didn’t know she knew. She was tired of this immersion in activity, itchy at the lack of privacy, beginning to resent the meetings, the endless talk, the painful and complex melding of two disparate cultures and traditions, the acrimonious clashing of the adherents of the several ideologies the exiles had brought with them. Thank god for daddy Sam, she thought. If anything works, it’s because he makes it work. Here’s almost as good; his tongue’s got two ends and he knows his people inside out. She shouldn’t be surprised, I suppose, the way he maneuvered us. His heart isn’t in it. She glanced at the two trees atop the ruined cliff, sighed. They were an impossibility. They made her uncomfortable, yet there was no way she could escape their presence here in the valley. Even inside the buildings when she couldn’t see them, she knew they were there. Magic. It permeated this place and she wanted out. She wanted paper and ink and quiet and, oh god, a place of her own where she could shut out the world and work.