Marion Zimmer Bradley's Ancestors of Avalon (14 page)

“What?” Reidel exclaimed in shock. “We know that land and sea can change their outlines, but the skies?”

The mage nodded solemnly. “I have many times verified it with a nightglass, and it only became more obvious with every hour. The heavens change just as we do, only more slowly. But over the centuries, the differences become clear. You must know something of the wandering stars—”

“I know that they wander along a predictable path.”

“Only because they have been observed for so many years. When the pole star upon which so many of our calculations are based suddenly moves—well, such a tremendous change is regarded as foreboding some equally great shift in the affairs of men—”

“Yes. A disaster. As we have seen,” observed Reidel.

Shielding her eyes from the glowing lanterns, Tiriki gazed upward. Mists veiled the horizon, but the moon was very new and had already set. Directly overhead the darkness was studded with stars in such profusion, it would be a wonder if she could make out any constellations at all.

“Perhaps,” Chedan was saying, “you may have heard old folks muttering that the days of spring and winter are not as they used to be. Well, they are not forgetful; they are right. Old Temple documents have proved it. The time of the planting season, the coming of the rains, all the cosmos is caught up in some unfathomable change—and we, too, must adapt, or perish.”

Tiriki wrenched her attention away from the confused splendor of the skies to try to make sense of his words. “What do you mean?”

“Ever since the fall of the Ancient Land, the princes have ruled without restraint, forgetting their duty to serve as they pursued power. Perhaps we were saved so that we might revitalize the ancient wisdom in a new land. I am not speaking of Micail, of course, or Reio-ta. And Prince Tjalan, too, is—was—a great man. Or would have been—”

Seeing Chedan’s distress, she reached to comfort him.

“No doubt you are right,” Reidel said briskly, “but at the moment it is getting us
to
the new land that must be my concern.”

“The stars may be unconstant,” Tiriki said, “but nothing has happened to the sun and moon, has it? By them we can sail east until we find land. And if there is no land—we can take further counsel then.”

Chedan smiled at her approvingly and Reidel nodded, seeing the sense of what she said. She sat back and let her eyes drift up again toward the patch of stars. Cold and high, they mocked her and every mortal being.
Rely on nothing,
they seemed to say,
for your hard-won knowledge will do you little good where you are going now.

 

Tiriki woke to the familiar sway of her hammock and groaned from the nausea that was becoming equally familiar within. It was the third day after the storm.

“Here,” said a quiet voice. “Use the basin.”

Tiriki opened her eyes and saw Damisa holding a brass bowl, and the sight of it intensified her need. After several painful moments she lay back and wiped her face with the damp cloth Damisa offered her.

“Thank you. I have never been a good sailor, but I would have thought I’d be accustomed to the motion by now.” Tiriki could not tell whether duty or liking had prompted her assistance, but she needed Damisa’s help too much to care. “How goes it with the ship?”

The girl shrugged. “The wind has come up, and every time the masts creak someone wonders whether they will crack, but without it we scarcely seem to move at all. If the wind blows contrary they complain that we’re lost, and when it dies they wail that we’ll all starve. Elis and I have cooked up a pot of gruel, by the way. You’ll feel better for a little fresh air and a bit of breakfast.”

Tiriki shuddered. “Not just yet, I think, but I will come on deck. I promised Chedan to help him work on revising the star maps, though the way I feel, I fear I’ll be able to do little more than make approving noises and hold his hand.”

“He’s not the only one who needs his hand held,” Damisa replied. “I’ve tried to keep the others too busy to get into mischief, but the deck pitches too much for the meditation postures, and we can only debate the sayings of the mages for so long. They may be young,” she added from the vantage of her nineteen years, “but they were selected for intelligence, and they can see our danger.”

“I suppose so,” Tiriki sighed. “Very well. I will come.”

“If you spend the morning with the others, I can do a thorough inventory of the supplies. With your permission, of course,” she added reluctantly.

Tiriki realized just how much of an afterthought that request had been and suppressed a smile. She could remember feeling a similar disdain for the ignorance of her juniors and the weaknesses of her elders when she was that age.

“Of course,” she echoed blandly. “And Damisa—I am grateful to you for taking on this responsibility while I’ve been ill.” In the dim light she could not see if the girl was blushing, but when Damisa replied her tone was calm.

“I was a princess of Alkonath before I was an acolyte. To lead is what I was brought up to do.”

 

Damisa had spoken with confidence, but by the time she finished her survey of the supplies stored in the
Crimson Serpent,
she was beginning to wish she had not claimed so much responsibility. But facing unpleasant truths was also part of the job. She could only hope that Captain Reidel, though he was only a commoner, would be able to do the same.

As expected, she found him with Chedan at the prow of the ship, calculating their position from the noon sighting of the sun.

“Damisa, my dear,” said the older man. “You look grave. What is wrong?”

“I have grave news.” Her gaze moved from him to the captain. “Our store of meal is going fast. At the rate we are using it,” she told them steadily, “the open bag will be empty after the evening meal, and there is only one more. I can make a thinner porridge, but that is not much nourishment for working men.”

Reidel frowned. “Once more I wish that our cook had made it on board. But I am sure that you are doing all you can. I would welcome any constructive suggestions. Are you telling me that we can feed ourselves for only two days more?”

“At this rate, more like one. I have noticed that
certain
people, and I don’t mean just townsfolk—” Damisa felt herself flushing beneath the intensity of his dark eyes. Strongly built, with bronzed skin and dark hair, he was typical of the Atlantean middle class, but she realized now that he was much younger than he had seemed from a distance, with a mouth that seemed more used to smiling than its present grim line. “Some people,” she repeated resolutely, “have been putting food aside. I know where some of it is hidden—and if your sailors helped me take it away from them, we could distribute it properly, and get at least one more meal for everyone. Perhaps more.”

“Yes.” Reidel sighed.

Chedan muttered, his eyes still on the curious, delicate apparatus of crystal rods connecting to cones with which he was calculating the angle from the horizon to the sun.

“I have already discussed all this with the other acolytes,” Damisa said into the silence. “We are accustomed to fasting,” she explained, and blushed again as both captain and mage turned to look at her. “And we are not working very hard, really. It will do us no harm to go on meditation rations for a while.”

Reidel’s eyes scanned her as if he were seeing her, as someone distinct from the rest of the priests’ caste, for the first time. Damisa felt herself blush beneath his scrutiny, but this time her eyes did not falter, and in the end it was he who looked away.

“We will come to land soon,” he murmured, staring at the horizon. “We must. When you talk to your friends . . . tell them . . . thank you.”

“I will,” she said. She turned to Chedan. “Come with me, Master. The acolytes are waiting in the stern of the ship. We can endure what we must, but we will do so with stronger hearts if you bring words of hope to us.”

The mage lifted an ironic eyebrow. “My dear, I think you have words enough already. No, no, it is not a reproof,” he hastened to assure her. “Truly you bring me hope, in the form of the strength you have plainly won from these hardships. We are in your debt.”

 

In the middle part of the deck, some of the sailors were splicing ropes broken in the latest gale while others worked at mending a spare sail. Chedan could feel their eyes on his back as he followed Damisa toward the stern, but the rules of caste kept anyone from questioning him. The acolytes, and one or two others of the priests’ caste, sat clustered in an informal semicircle beneath an impromptu awning made from the remains of a sail too torn to be worth repairing. Their conversations came to a ragged stop as they recognized the renowned Master Chedan Arados, and he surveyed them with interest in return.

He had first met Damisa when she was a child on Alkonath. She had been outspoken then, and if she was introducing him now as if she had gone out and captured him, he supposed she was entitled to do so. He had been too busy struggling with his star charts to pay much attention to the acolytes, but with Tiriki so ill he supposed it was his duty.

As Damisa rather ostentatiously seated herself upon the floor mat amid her fellows, the mage settled his aching bones upon a coil of rope, gazing from one youthful face to another with what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

“I regret that until now I have been too busy to visit you,” he began, “but everything that I have heard in these last few days tells me that in these difficult circumstances you have made yourselves useful. Where guidance is not needed, I know better than to provide it. But I understand there are some here who feel that our situation is hopeless. Now it is only reasonable to worry—indeed it is very sensible, placed as we are—but it would be wrong to despair.”

Little Iriel made a sound that could have been laughter or a stifled sob. “Wrong? Master, much of our training is in reading signs. When the sun begins to set, we know the dark will fall. If the stars do not shine, there may be rain. The signs I see now say we will die out here, for we have neither seen any other ship nor sighted land.”

A winged shadow crossed the deck and Chedan’s gaze followed it, lifting until he saw the bird flash white against the azure sky.

“I do not dispute what you have seen.” He turned back to Iriel. “Although I have traveled more widely than most, even I cannot be absolutely certain of our exact position. But you are drawing your conclusion before all the evidence has come in. Do not fall into the error of those who see change only as decline and say that in the end there will be darkness. In the end, too, is light—light that will show us at last the cosmos and our true place in it, the purpose of our hopes and our losses, our loves, our dreams—”

“Yes, Master, we do not doubt that our spirits will survive.” Kalaran’s handsome face was contorted in a sneer. “But if we are so important, why do the gods leave us suspended on the edge of the world?”

“Kalaran, Kalaran.” Chedan shut his eyes and shook his head. “You come through fire and destruction almost unscathed, and now you complain about a little suspense? No wonder the gods so rarely intervene! By their mercy we have been granted a path out of the devastation, but that is not enough? We must face rough conditions!” Chedan waggled his fingers, mock-horrified. “All is surely lost.” He waited as a little ripple of nervous laughter passed around the circle.

“Children of bygone Atlantis,” he went on, more softly, “we have lost all save one another, but when I say we should be thankful for our troubles I am not merely repeating worn-out philosophies. We would not
have
those troubles if we had not survived! Surely you do not think it is a mistake to survive, merely because things are changed.”

“But we
are
lost!” Kalaran objected, and a muttered agreement echoed him.

“It is worse than that,” young Selast exclaimed from her place at Damisa’s side, her slight frame quivering with nervous energy. “The sailors say we have sailed right off the world!”

“In my experience,” Chedan answered, glancing back down the ship, “sailors will say a great many outrageous things to the young and innocent. I would advise you not to believe everything that you hear.

“But let us consider for a moment that these rumors are true, and we have sailed off the world. How do you know that we will not just as easily sail back onto it? The sea is vast and wild, but it is finite. We will find land, and sooner rather than later. But let me warn you in advance, my dear young friends, when we come again to the shore, we will probably
not
find warm halls or servants waiting with fine foods and tasty drinks.”

And just at that moment, as if the priest’s words had been nothing less than prophecy, there came a squawk and then a shout from the sharp-sighted man Reidel had sent up to the masthead.

“Land! My captain, that be no cloud on the horizon! ’Tis land I see for sure!”

 

In the euphoria of discovery, they forgot that to catch sight of land was not the same as reaching it. As they drew closer, those who were far-sighted described high cliffs of brownish stone, sculpted by wind and water into columns and towers. At their feet waves frothed in a vicious swirl.

“I think it is the Casseritides, the Isle of Tin, whose southern horn the traders call Beleri’in,” breathed Chedan. “These must be the cliffs at the tip of the peninsula. On the southwestern shore, there is a bay with an island where the traders put in.”

Reidel leaned into the tiller, and the sailors did their best, but the wind was from the east, and the most they could do without the midsail was to set the
Crimson Serpent
wallowing broadside toward the toothed cliffs. Swearing in defeat, Reidel turned his ship toward the relative safety of the open sea once more.

“Are there other harbors on the northern shore?” Tiriki asked softly, unable to tear her eyes from the dim coast until it had almost vanished in the evening fog.