“So if you defeated Z’Nelia, her people would be more likely to accept your right to rule them than the right of a foreigner.”
“I am a foreigner. I have my own lands to rule, far from here,” Wulfston told her as he had told Sukuru.
“I don’t want the lands of the Zionae.”
“Perhaps you have come to take possession of the Warimu.”
“The Warimu? Norgu’s people?”
“Norgu is not Warimu, nor was his father.”
“More Zionae,” Wulfston realized. “Well, that makes sense. With Z’Nelia ruling the Zionae, or earlier if her parents were as powerful as she is, any Zionae Adepts- Movers-who wanted to rule would find it easier to conquer another tribe than fight someone like Z’Nelia. But Princess Tadisha, I don’t want Norgu’s lands, either.”
“He will think you do, just as everyone in the Assembly does.”
“Why?”
“Because you and Norgu, are so obviously related.”
“Just because we’re both of Zionae ancestry?”
“Didn’t you see it?” she asked in astonishment. “It goes far beyond tribal characteristics. You and Norgu have a strong family resemblance.”
“I don’t look anything like Norgu!” Wulfston protested, recalling the flabby, overweight boy with round face and unpleasantly pouting features. “Besides, Barak would have known, if he knows everything about people when he meets them.”
“Barak knows of you only what has happened in your lifetime, unless you tell him stories of your family.”
“I see, ” said Wulfston. “And if I had such stories, and believed them to be true-”
“-he would perceive them as true, as he did the story he was told of your prowess.”
“Then a Grioka may be wrong.”
“About stories and songs, yes. Never about direct experience,” Tadisha explained. “The gods give the Griokae that gift, and the ability to make hearers experience what they tell. In return, the gods give them the obligation of recording our history, and passing it from one generation to another.
“Griokae are very wise,” she continued, “and highly respected. If we Karili offended Barak by chiding him for his mistake about you, he might refuse to tell stories of us. He would not teach them to other Griokae. Eventually, the memory of the Karili would be gone from the history of Africa, as if we had never been.”
Wulfston saw in Tadisha’s green eyes how very important it was to her that her people be remembered.
“What if,” he suggested, “Barak would not tell the story of Z’Nelia’s defeat of the Savishnon before today, because she offended him, and he did not want her victory remembered?”
Her expression told him much. “That is a Grioka’s only weapon against so powerful a Mover, but it is a mighty weapon indeed.”
“So,” said Wulfston, “the history of a person is that important here-so much so that because I do not know the history of my family you try to create one, by seeing a resemblance to Norgu?”
“I’m not the only one who saw it. When you first entered the Assembly, and again later, when you and Norgu stood side by side. You could be his brother, Lord Wulfston. You are certainly an uncle or cousin in some degree.”
“Impossible.”
To Wulfston’s annoyance, laughter twinkled in Tadisha’s eyes. “Are you that vain, then? I agree; Norgu makes himself unattractive with his overindulgence in food and his sneers and pouting. But let him harden his body with work, and gain maturity and character in his face, and one day he might be as handsome as you are.”
Wulfston did not like that topic of conversation, or Tadisha’s attempt to turn it to a joke. “Never mind Norgu’s appearance. Why did he lie to me about Lenardo?”
“A childish fit of anger when the Assembly would not bow to his will?” Tadisha suggested.
“From someone who has been ruling his own lands for a year?” Wulfston asked. “That may have been part of it, but he could not survive many impulsive acts, considering the enemies he has.”
“Perhaps he hoped you would leave if you thought your friend beyond your help.”
“No… put yourself in Norgu’s place, Princess Tadisha. Did you notice his reaction as he relived his father’s death? There was no grief! He almost… reveled in the bloodshed.” He looked into her eyes, trying to open to her Reading so that she would know he spoke truly. “I have seen such cases in my own land, among young people who have lost their families in the violence of Adept warfare. Their minds cannot cope with such grief. Their emotions become twisted. Norgu is very dangerous. There is no predicting how someone like that will react.”
She nodded. “He will see you as a threat, especially if he recognizes that you are of his family. He must think you have come to take his throne. While I can See that you would indeed go home this day if he reunited you with your brother, Norgu probably fears that the two of you together would turn on him.”
“I suspect,” Wulfston said slowly, “that he is even more manipulative than that. He wants me to think that Lenardo is dead so that I will take revenge on his supposed murderer. Revenge Norgu understands.
Remember his pleasure in destroying his fathers attackers? But someone sent those killers, and Norgu has not yet had revenge on that someone.”
Tadishas green eyes showed grim understanding. “We Karili are too close to Norgu. We see him as a spoiled child, but he has developed a dangerous cunning. He told you Z’Nelia killed Lenardo. He must think Z’Nelia sent the men who murdered Matu-and of course he could be right.”
Tadisha paused abruptly, staring at him. “I just realized that you never- Lord Wulfston, I do not think I have ever met a man before-at least not a man of such powers- whose first thought would not be of revenge.” She lowered her eyes, suddenly closed to Reading. “Wise men would then put the thought from their minds, knowing revenge only brings more revenge. But what kind of man does not even consider it?”
“One who has witnessed a lifetime of war, and wants no more of it,” he replied. “If Lenardo were truly dead, how would it help his people or his wife and children for me to risk my life in revenge? Those who counsel war would say if I did not kill Z’Nelia she would decide that I was weak, and soon she would come to the Savage Empire to depose me. But how likely is that, when she has her own battles right here?”
“That is true,” agreed Tadisha.
“If, however, I challenged her, provoked her, either she would kill me now, leaving my sister without my help, or if I succeeded in killing or otherwise defeating her, her heirs would then seek revenge on me, perpetuating an enmity I never wanted in the first place.”
Tadisha asked, “Where you come from, do you stand alone in these ideas?”
“No. One ruler cannot end the cycle of revenge; other lords would simply kill him and continue warring, the history of the Savage Lands before this generation. Our alliance is a precarious thing, which must be nurtured for the future. Were Lenardo dead, my first duty would be to go home and help to preserve it.
As it is, my first duty is to rescue my brother. Will your Assembly allow me to address them?”
“I think so. Come, then, and I will present your petition.”
Wulfston was, indeed, allowed to present his offer to aid the Karili against the Savishnon, in return for their help, first in locating his missing friends and the Night Queen crew, and then in retrieving Lenardo from Norgu.
“How much help can you be to us?” challenged Kamas.
“If you had not drugged me,” Wulfston replied, “I could demonstrate my powers. Let me explain it this way: undrugged and rested, I can do all that you saw Norgu’s father do in the vision Barak provided-and more. I also have many years’ experience at teaching people with minor powers to use them to best advantage… and to unite them to overcome someone of greater power. If all of you were to work together, as the Movers and Seers of my homeland do, even a Mover of Z’Nelias powers would be helpless against you.”
“Would you then set yourself up as our leader?” Ashuru questioned in acid tones.