Marion Zimmer Bradley's Ancestors of Avalon (46 page)

“Whatever they do or don’t have,” observed Elara, “they have learned to survive. I don’t know how many casks of wine Tjalan and the others brought with them, but when they are emptied, there will be no more. Maybe Chedan and Tiriki are wiser than we, to begin by learning how to live as we shall all have to do one day.”

“Not once the stone circle is finished,” put in Karagon. “We’ll have enough power to deal with anything then.”

“
Should
it be finished?” asked Lanath. “There’s something about this whole place that gives
me
the shivers.”

“The point is, people should be free to make up their own minds, and locking them up or forcing them to move does not accord with the traditions of the Temple that I learned!” Elara said.

Cleta nodded. “I agree. In Ahtarrath, Lord Micail was both prince and archpriest, so there was no conflict—but lately—I don’t know. I would feel happier if we knew what has happened to Reidel.”

“He’s just some common sailor,” sneered Karagon.

“No, Damisa said he was an initiate,” corrected Li’ija. “But it doesn’t matter. Tjalan should
not
just spirit either of them away.”

Galara sighed. “All right. What do you suggest we do?”

“I told you I went looking,” Elara said. “I checked every building. He is not in the compound.”

“Maybe he already ran home,” Karagon offered hopefully.

“Let’s not count on it,” Cleta recommended. “If he is not here, he may be in the village.”

One by one, all the heads turned again toward Elara. She was the one who had developed the most significant ties among the Ai-Zir.

“Very well. I will go.”

 

She found Queen Khayan-e-Durr at her usual occupation, spinning wool with her women in the warm spring sun. After the customary ceremonious greetings, Elara began to tell her story, but she was not really surprised to find that the queen already knew. The problem, evidently, was how to make her care.

“If Prince Tjalan has his way there will be no chieftainship for your son to inherit. If the prince seeks to corral his own people, do you think he will let yours roam free?” Elara could not tell if she was making any impression. “Anything that helps those who have different ideas will hobble his power.”

“That’s so,” said the queen, “but many years ago, two of our shamans had a quarrel. By the time it was ended, a plague had struck both tribes. Who will lie dead, I wonder, when your mages are done?”

“Would you rather live safely as slaves?” exclaimed Elara. “You will have to choose a side!”
When,
she wondered then,
did
I
choose?

Khayan gave her an odd look. “So you betray your own people?”

“I don’t believe I do,” she answered soberly. “I think that some of them betray themselves. As for me, I am faithful to my gods.”

The queen sketched the sign of Caratra on her breast. “This Tiriki, Lord Micail’s wife. She is sworn to the Goddess?”

“So I have heard—although she has served the Temple of Light.”

“We will seek to help her.” Khayan smiled. “But whether the result will be to reunite her with Micail or to estrange them is in the lap of the gods . . . It is not enough to release these prisoners, if that is truly what they are. Soon enough, Tjalan will find someone from the tribes who knows the way to the Lake lands. We do not often go there, but the way is no secret. This Reidel, too, will need a guide, or his enemies will arrive before he does. A guide, and an offer of alliance,” she added thoughtfully, “else we may all be sucked into a needless war. I will tell this to Tjalan once they are safely gone.”

“Be careful!” exclaimed Elara. “I would not have his wrath fall upon you!”

“He will be very sorry if it does,” the queen replied. “Every soul in Azan would rise to avenge any hurt to me! If Tjalan does not understand that, then you and Lady Timul had better tell him.”

 

As the season turned toward the solstice the weather around the Tor became even more capricious, as if unable to decide between winter and summer. While Tiriki waited for Damisa and Reidel to return, she sought to relieve her frustration by working on the pathway around the Tor.

The day is like my spirit,
thought Tiriki, looking from the raw earth of the pathway to the clouds,
perched between.

To know that Micail lived was ecstasy, but the thought of him with this native priestess was a betrayal worse than loss. Yet at the same time she understood that the duties of a priest or priestess might require a ritual mating to energize the fertility of the land.
I did not do so,
she thought with a rush of passion.

Micail could have slept with this native princess for that reason, she told herself. Anet had not implied that she wanted Micail as a lover, but as a bull brought to the cows—to improve the herd. But what haunted Tiriki’s nights was the fact that Anet had not said whether or not Micail had agreed to lie with her . . . and Tiriki had not asked.

And if he took her to bed from simple need can I blame him?
she asked herself for the hundredth time.
He thought
I
was dead. Surely I have often enough wished him alive and
able
to find comfort—wherever he could. Did I stay faithful from virtue, or because no one presented me with any temptation to stray?
There was no fault in the reasoning, but in her heart of hearts, she could not accept it. If she had been condemned to sleep in an empty bed these five years, Micail should have slept alone as well!

She jammed the antler tool viciously into the soil, as if by removing the dirt she could get rid of her uncertainty. She could not even rail at Chedan for so quickly sending Anet away with Damisa and Reidel while she slept. All spring the mage had been short of breath. He said old age was catching up with him, but she feared it might be something more than a cough that warm weather had not cured.

She looked up as Elis, who had been working on a section of the spiral above hers, gave a shout. “Someone is coming! He has—black hair. Stars above, it’s Reidel!”

“Quiet, all of you!” Chedan’s tone, not his volume, cut through the babble of assorted priests and priestesses. “Obviously all of this is a—surprise. To us all.”

Guided by one of the Ai-Zir hunters, Reidel had cut the journey time by almost a third on his return, but the hollows in his cheeks and the shadows around his eyes came not from fatigue, thought the mage, but from anxiety.

“I could hardly believe the prince would use force to make us join him; he must know how we’ve dreamed of finding other survivors.” Reidel glanced at Tiriki, whose face, after his first news, had ceased to show any emotion at all. “But it is hard to misinterpret a guard on one’s door! And though Damisa has better quarters than they gave me, she is still a prisoner!”

“What can Prince Tjalan be thinking?” exclaimed Liala. “He cannot lock up a chosen acolyte of the Temple!”

“An outrage,” Dannetrasa seconded him.

“Yes, yes,” Chedan interrupted. “But if you will be patient for a little longer, I would like a bit more information from Reidel himself, and for that, it would be helpful if I could hear myself think . . .”

He turned back to the man who stood before him. “I believe we can be certain that no harm will come to Damisa,” he said soothingly. “She is Prince Tjalan’s cousin. I can assure you, he will keep her in safety.”

“Fear more for the prince,” muttered Iriel. “Have you
seen
Damisa when she’s mad?” A ripple of laughter from around the circle released some of the tension.

“Her anger is what got
me
released,” said Reidel. “Or at least got Elara to ask the Ai-Zir to help me. I was dumbfounded when the queen herself walked into the house where they were holding me. Tjalan’s guards were slumped on the ground outside, sleeping like babies—the queen had slipped a potion into their beer. Tjalan won’t suspect her; they knocked out a hole in the wall from inside so it would look as if I escaped that way.”

“I am glad to hear that Elara helped you,” said Chedan. “Later I will want to hear more from you about the acolytes, but at present it is their elders that concern me. We have made you a priest, Reidel, but you are still our best-qualified military man. In your estimation, what forces, in the physical realm, does Tjalan have?”

The young man pulled himself together and began to describe what he had seen. As Chedan had expected, Reidel had made a full assessment of Tjalan’s soldiers without even being aware of doing so.

“Over a hundred?” exclaimed Kalaran when Reidel’s report was finished. “Well, we can’t defend ourselves by force of arms!”

“By magic, then?” Dannetrasa said dubiously. “They outnumber us there, too. They have
eight
Vested Guardians, you said? And four acolytes—and
other
priests and priestesses?”

“Including Micail . . .” Tiriki spoke without inflection. The unvoiced question hung in all their minds—had Micail been powerless to prevent Damisa’s imprisonment, or did he support Prince Tjalan?

Chedan sighed. “And Ardral. But we have one advantage. All this time we have wondered what use the Omphalos Stone would be in this new land. If they seek to attack us by spiritual means, we can invoke the Stone, and they will do as much harm to themselves as to us. But if it comes to a true magical battle—” He shook his head. “We will
all
lose. No, we must win them over instead. Somehow—”

“We must meet with them,” Tiriki said, in that unnaturally even tone. “Or some of them . . . not there, not here, but in a neutral location.” She looked up, her voice breaking at last. “I will
not
believe Micail could betray me! But I cannot risk the rest of you.”

“We cannot risk
you
!” Liala objected.

“But Chedan could not manage the journey—” Tiriki held up one hand as he began to protest. “And we must not both go. If Micail’s . . . allegiance . . . is in question . . . you must agree he is most likely to listen to me.”

Chedan sighed again. No doubt this was his repayment for having prevented her from going before. He had been right then, and he suspected she knew it, but she most certainly knew that he would not be able to stop her now.

“There are the remains of an old hillfort about halfway between here and Azan,” said Reidel unexpectedly. “We camped there on the way. We might arrange to meet them there. I am willing to go back and tell them so.”

You are willing to go back to Damisa,
thought Chedan, but he kept silent. Reidel’s devotion did him credit, after all.

“Very well. We will take two of your best sailors as escorts, but no more. This is to be a parley, not a fight,” Tiriki reminded him. “Perhaps Tjalan will come in force while I am gone, so we must keep as many men here as we can. She surveyed the roomful of faces. “Elis, Rendano, would you be willing to accompany me?”

Chedan did not expect either of them to decline, and they did not, although it would have been hard to say which of them looked more uneasy. Even now, the thought of contesting the will of a famous adept like Ardral would have given him pause . . . Chedan found himself wondering again what position his uncle held in Tjalan’s new community. Reidel had only briefly encountered Ardral there, and they had not spoken to each other, but Anet’s description of the old adept lingered in Chedan’s mind. By now, the canny old man probably knew what was going on better than Tjalan or Micail did . . .

I know all of them so well,
the mage thought.
I should be there. But Tiriki is right,
he realized, as a sharp twinge in his knee reminded him of his own fragility.
I really cannot make the journey now.

“Tiriki,” said Chedan, as they left the meeting hall, “I hope that it is entirely unnecessary for me to tell you to be careful. But remember—the riddle of fate is that we continually choose our own nemesis. And it is not usually the one we think we are choosing at the time.”