"What news of the queen?" he eventually asked.
"She lives," Hunt said. His Acacian-with its clipped formality characteristic of the urban residents of Aos-contrasted with the coarse farm laborer's garb he currently wore. He looked almost as out of place in it as King Grae and his brother. "That would be bad enough, but she now charms the people with her good works. The streets of Aos are a-buzz with it. When I sailed from Alyth a troupe of players was acting out her magical deeds. I believe they were paid by the city officials to do it, but, still, people were watching."
"Street performers!" Lady Shenk complained. "They're as fickle as the weather."
"Yes, but they've voiced our message to the people more often than not," Barad said. "Elaz, you were closest to the queen recently. Tell us what you observed."
The former warehouse manager from Nesreh set down his spoon before he spoke. "I did as you asked, Barad. I joined the throng following the queen's caravan. It was a small group at first, sycophants and beggars, but their numbers grew as tales of her deeds spread. She had made her way across northern Talay, and everywhere she went she left miracles in her wake. She made dry wells gush with water."
"Through what trick?" Renold asked. He was a scholar newly defected from the academy at Bocoum.
"I know not. I have seen the water flowing in the Bocoum canals. It's real water. Not a cloud in the sky. The air dry as a desert. And yet she filled them. The landowners were ecstatic. The peasants got drunk on the stuff, jumping and swimming the irrigation canals. I can't explain it, but everything I'm describing I witnessed. If it wasn't the queen's work, I'd think it a great blessing to us all."
"If it wasn't the queen's work, it would be a blessing," Hunt said, "but we know she does nothing without her own purpose. To fatten a pig, a farmer will feed him well. The pig must think his life a paradise, never knowing he gorges himself so that he will be fatter for the knife later on."
"You compare the queen to a pig farmer, then?" Ganet asked.
Hunt shrugged.
"Pig farmer or not," Elaz continued, "she has worked miracles, without a doubt. Children come out to her caravan as it approaches new towns. Even old women with tear-filled eyes call out to her. I've seen this myself. Young girls from the villages threw wildflower petals at her feet. They've taken to calling her 'Mother of Life.'"
"She made the title up herself!" Lady Shenk said. "She's wily, Barad. I'm not sure that you're a match for her after all."
The large man furrowed his brow. "It is not a matter of my being a match for her. It's the will of the people that must best her."
Renold smirked. "All the worse for us. The 'people' are lapping up her gifts. And, in truth, it's no small thing that she can make water flow from a dry well. She works sorcery. Think about that. It can only be that she has discovered Santoth secrets."
"The Song of Elenet," Hunt whispered.
The group fell silent. Barad opened his mouth to say something dismissive, but he was unsure of what to say and chose to share the silence. The Song of Elenet. Could it be, he wondered for the hundredth time, that such a book exists and that Corinn has it? Throughout most of his life he had considered Santoth lore simply fantasy, stories meant to amuse the masses and feed the Acacians' sense of their past grandeur. But that was before Aliver and the way he dream whispered the masses off mist, before the sorcerers appeared on the fields of Talay to destroy Hanish Mein's army, and before giant beasts began popping up here and there like weeds. Something had changed in the world. There were old powers at work once again, and-if that was true-it might also be true that the queen had found a way to tap into them. That was a dreadful thought, and it was not the only one they had to face.
To change the subject, Barad asked Renold to detail what he had learned about the league's plans. The scholar said that on most things the league was impenetrable and their specific intentions shrouded as if by the mist they once trafficked in. Most who sailed the Gray Slopes believed that the league had burned what remained of their damaged platforms and abandoned the site in exchange for the Outer Isles. League vessels patrolled the archipelago's waters like barracuda seeking prey, boarding any ship that blundered too near, even sinking a few and leaving the crews bobbing in the waters, food for sharks.
It wasn't possible for him to get to the islands, but Renold had found out a few things about their doings through barroom interviews along the Coastal Towns. In Tendor he had spoken to squatters who had been ousted from the islands by Ishtat Inspectorate officers. Several used spyglasses and had seen league engineers surveying the land; and a few reported having been hired as laborers on compounds of buildings that dotted the island chain. Another man claimed to have shuttled a shipload of wooden dowels and thin boards to Thrain. He had noted the cargo because there were so many of the same objects, with no explanation given as to what they were for. The sailor had speculated that they were to be made into training swords, but Renold had a different idea.
"I realized it when I stopped at my sister's house on my way here," he said. "She has four children, two of them still young enough that they sleep in cribs. The slats that make up the crib's sides are just as the sailor described." Something about this made him uncomfortable enough that his words choked to a halt. The others waited as he took a drink of water, then cleared his throat. He gestured with his hands that he needed a moment to explain. "In the past, the quota was taken regularly from each province. Aushenia avoided this for generations, but I'm sure you've felt the insult of it in recent years." He glanced at Grae, and went to sip again from his wooden cup. It appeared to be empty. "You pay the quota now, just as any other province-"
"Aushenia is not a province," Grae said.
"As you say," Renold demurred. "Regardless, I think a time may come when the league no longer collects quota." Several began to question him, surprised, but he spoke through it. "The isles are to become plantations for the production of one crop: children. That's what they are building. Compounds in which mothers will give birth to children. That's what those dowels are for-for the cribs they will sleep in. Thousands of them."
Hunt said, "As in a factory?"
Renold nodded. "There will be mothers and fathers and children who never know freedom. They will live and die on those islands or in the Other Lands."
"Can this be true?" Elaz asked.
"Monstrous," Hunt said.
"Worse than monstrous," Renold added. "It will look clean to the world. The people won't see it, but it will go on and on."
"They'll see it if we shout about it!" Lady Shenk said.
"Perhaps, but if they cover their ears…"
Barad let them argue for a while. Renold had confirmed what he had already expected. It was good that the group hear such things from one another, though. He had always known the league was capable of anything-anything at all-that would ensure their profits. This business on the islands was a logical progression of sorts. Why roam the Known World rounding up children, taking them from parents who then needed to be appeased or quelled? It was inefficient and messy. How much better to control production themselves, to treat the children purely as products, and to do it all far from the sight of the masses? If it proved feasible, the day might indeed come when the queen and the league stopped requiring quota from the provinces. Corinn could declare that she had freed them from the burden, and the Known World wouldn't feel the crime. If that happened, they could shout about it all they wanted. People rarely believe what they cannot see. Not, at least, when seeing is more frightening than not.