Marion Zimmer Bradley's Ancestors of Avalon (28 page)

Now that winning smile was turned on them. Micail glared, but Ardral’s dry chuckle defused his anger.

“Why not?” said the Seventh Guardian, lifting his cup in salute to the king and then draining it. He turned to Micail and whispered, “The old Bull should toast us in return, don’t you think?” He cast a meaningful look at the golden beaker, and then, without waiting for Micail’s answer, began to sing.

Ardral’s baritone was both deep and resonant, whatever his age. The note he produced was wordless, but focused very precisely. Khattar set the golden cup down rather hastily as it began to vibrate in his hand. A sidelong look from Ardral invited Micail to join the game.

Why shouldn’t I?
he thought suddenly.
Who are these barbarians to sneer at the son of a hundred kings?
He took a deep breath, and with equal precision, produced a second note, a half tone higher than Ardral’s, directed to the same target. The beaker rattled and danced on the wood of the table—then rose and for a long moment hovered in midair, slowly turning on its own axis, until finally, with equal deliberation, it sank back down to rest beside the high king’s trembling hand.

For a moment Khattar simply stared. Then he slapped his hand down upon the table. As the beaker fell over, he began to laugh in a booming voice that seemed to grow louder and louder, until Micail’s ears could hardly bear the sound.

W
hen the archpriest Bevor first told me I was to be an acolyte, the year before the Sinking,” Selast observed—“can you believe that was three years ago? Anyway, he
said
I would be required to discipline mind and body beyond anything I had ever known . . . But I thought the fasting was supposed to be voluntary!”

Damisa nodded, but kept her eyes on the three Lake women she and Selast were following down the narrow path edged with spiky weeds. “Willed hunger is only a discomfort of the flesh,” she quoted, without sarcasm. Damisa really thought she was becoming almost accustomed to the empty feeling in her belly, and the way her clothing hung loosely on her once-sturdy frame . . . “To discipline the spirit against the body’s demands,” she finished the quote, “is the only surety against the illusions of wealth and security.”

“Uh-huh, lovely,” Selast muttered, “but it’s one thing to understand how the marsh folk live, never knowing if their supplies will be sufficient, trusting in the gods—” She glanced at Damisa and forced a laugh. “But I thought we’d
done that
on the ship! Besides, we did a lot better than this last year. We did better than this the year we got here! Plenty of food then.”

“Hush,” Damisa advised. “You’re getting yourself worked up for nothing. Anyway, this year is always harder than last year—haven’t you noticed? And
you’re
always hungry, every year.”

The other girl grimaced, but did not deny it. Even in her homeland of Cosarrath, where she had been allowed to eat whenever and whatever she wanted, there had never been an ounce of fat on Selast. Prowling along the path in a short blue tunic, she looked every inch a creature of the wilderness, ever wary, muscles rippling beneath the taut brown flesh.

Yet just the other day she heard one of the boys say she looked about as cuddly as a skinned rabbit,
Damisa reflected with a shake of her head.
That can’t be right.

In the old days, or so she had heard, even a betrothed acolyte had been free to take a lover, sometimes even more than one. Here, apparently, no one had done so. But it didn’t help that there were hardly any men around, at least not men of the priests’ caste.
There’s Kalaran, who just doesn’t seem all that appealing, and Rendano, who obviously isn’t interested, and of course Master Chedan, but, well—

Unbidden, an image of Reidel came to mind, his deep warm eyes, his strong shoulders . . . Damisa banished the thought with a shake of her head. In Atlantis, the genealogists of the Temple would have been horrified at the very idea of such a connection, and she agreed. But lately Tiriki had mentioned the possibility of inviting someone from among the sailors or merchants into the priesthood. Of course, Damisa knew that in the troubled times before the rise of the Sea Kings, a fair number from the other castes had been taken in. She herself came of the royalty of Alkonath, and Selast was of the pure noble stock as well, but the majority of the acolytes had ancestors of more humble origins.

Not that it mattered anymore. Damisa sighed.
We girls will just have to lie down with one another, as they say the warrior women do on the plains of the Ancient Land . . .
She stifled a snort of laughter, but her gaze returned speculatively to Selast. Almost unconsciously, she began to copy the Cosarran’s stealthy gait . . . until she caught herself doing it, blushed, and tripped over her own sandals.

Just around the turn in the path, the marsh women had paused to make an offering at one of their forest shrines, a primitive affair of braided straw and feathers set in the hollow of an oak tree. Damisa felt a renewed pang of hunger as she glimpsed the tubers of wild onion laid there. How strange to realize that here a few roots were a sacrifice more precious than incense . . . But if the way-shrines were more modest than the pyramids and towers of Atlantis, she had to admit the powers here were well served, for they seemed to reward such simplicity.

As far as Damisa could tell—although all the hunting and foraging severely limited the time available for theological analysis—the spirits of this land were much more approachable than the gods of Atlantis, who were in essence nonhuman forces who dwelt beyond the mortal sphere. For all their legendary quirks and feuds, Manoah or Ni-Terat seemed less like individuals than signifiers, representatives of the immeasurable powers that moved the sun and the stars.

Although sailors prayed to the Star Shaper because he was the Lord of the Sea, and children prayed to the Great Maker because it helped them to sleep at night, not even Ni-Terat, the Dark Mother of All, had interceded to save a single human life. Only Caratra, the Nurturer, the Child Who Becomes the Mother, was traditionally believed to demonstrate a genuine interest in ordinary people, and that was only a few times a year.

In contrast, the Lake folk honored the simple spirits of field and forest. But they did not treat them as great gods; they were not magnificent beings who might eventually grant a favor, but . . .
The Lake gods seem more like good neighbors,
Damisa decided,
inclined to be helpful whether they notice you or not . . .

She shivered a little as she approached the tree, wondering as always if what she felt at such rustic shrines was an illusion somehow created by the beliefs of the marsh folk or something more genuine—the actual presence of a real spirit.

“Shining One, accept my offering,” she muttered as she tucked a spray of white hawthorn blooms into the straw. “Help us find food for our people.” She stood back to let Selast kneel and add some primroses. As they gazed up into the branches where the new leaves filtered the sunlight to lucent pale green, all the air seemed to shimmer and dance.

For a moment, then, Damisa seemed to feel the touch of a presence on her soul—curious, a little amused, but not unfriendly. Instinctively she sank to her knees, resting her hands upon the damp soil.
Someone
was listening, and that was more than she had ever felt in any of the splendid temples of Alkona or Ahtarra.

“Bright One! Help me! I am so hungry here!”
her heart cried, and in that moment she realized that her emptiness was not that of the body, but of the soul.

Selast had already gone after the Lake women. Damisa got to her feet, glad that the other girl had not seen her moment of weakness. Her business just now was to find food for their bodies, and until they did her spirit would just have to fend for itself.

In the first year, the refugees had cleared ground near the springs and planted the seeds they had brought with them, but perhaps they had not done so at the right time, for their first harvest had failed entirely. Without the nut flour the saji women made, the preserves of fruits, the good fortune of the sailors in their incessant hunting, and the hearty cooperation of one and all, the refugees might have fought a hunger more gnawing than they had ever known.

They did better in some ways the following year, but the amount of food ripe enough to be harvested had been small indeed. If Elis had not had a real talent for growing things, their survival would have been even more doubtful. Although she could hardly “make a rock bear fruit,” as Liala often said, nevertheless, every seed Elis had personally planted took root and lived. She had even been able to persuade the battered feather tree that had once belonged to Lord Micail to thrive.

According to the marsh folk, there were tribes farther inland who sowed grain and kept cattle. The marsh folk lived by the fruits of the earth because the land was unsuitable for farming. Yet the natives had never hesitated to share what they had, and were always willing to take the Atlanteans with them to hunt or forage for edible plants and waterfowl, fish and shellfish, and a wealth of other resources for those who knew where to find them. That was, after all, why Heron’s tribe came here.

But life by the lake is not so bountiful when the warm season ends! They probably think we’re all idiots because we stay.
Damisa laughed, then quickened her pace to catch up with the others. She grimaced, envying the efficient way Selast had of loping along. Perhaps she could catch up if she took a shortcut across the meadow . . . but the ground beneath the soft grass was part bog. With the next step, her foot went through the soft surface and with a cry she went down. She had just managed to get free, leg muddy to the knee, when Selast ran back to her.

“Don’t try to sit up!” the younger girl snapped. “Where does it hurt? Let me see!” Her clever fingers probed Damisa’s ankle and then her knee.

“I’m fine, really, just muddy,” Damisa insisted, though in truth, it was rather pleasant to feel those warm fingers on her skin. She plucked a handful of grass and tried to wipe her leg clean.

With a sigh of relief, Selast sat down beside her.

“Thank you!” Sudden warmth filled Damisa and she reached out to give the other girl a hug of gratitude. Selast was all muscle and bone; it was like holding some supple wild thing. For a moment everything was very still, but then Selast hugged back, hard, but not roughly . . .

“We had better rest until we can be sure that foot will bear you,” Selast said a few moments later. But Damisa, astonished by how pleasant it felt to hold the other girl in her arms, did not let go.

“Do you remember the shop in Ahtarra,” she asked wistfully, “just by the pylon, where they sold those delicious little cakes dribbled with honey?” She eased back upon the soft grass and Selast went with her, nestling into the curve of her arm.

“Oh yes,” Selast was saying, with her eyes half closed. “I’d die for just one! This year the stupid emmer and barley seeds had better figure out how to grow! Nuts make good flour in a pinch I guess, but—it’s not the same.”

Damisa sighed, half consciously stroking Selast’s strong shoulders. “When I was a little girl in Alkona, they would bring in cartloads of grapes and ila berries from the vineyards in the hills at summer’s end, so many they didn’t even care if they spilled over the wagon-sides. And more and more of them fell off, getting crushed on the cobbles, until the gutters looked as if they were running with wine.”

“Never be able to grow good grapes here. Not enough sun . . .” But there was light enough to turn Selast’s skin to gold, glowing warm against the wind-ruffled meadow grass.

Damisa pushed herself up on one arm and looked down at her. “Your lips are just the color of those grapes,” she whispered.

Selast stared up at her, her face filled with light. “Taste them,” she dared, and smiled.

By the time they caught up with the others, it was past midday. The marsh women clustered, softly gossiping as they poked into the dense reeds around the lakeside. Hearing Damisa and Selast approach, one of the women gabbled excitedly and pointed; then, as the two girls clearly did not understand, the woman flapped her hands, and cupped them, as if she were cradling something between her palms.