Sons of Destiny Prequel Series 003 - The Shifter (23 page)

"Weather divination?" Kenyen asked her. She quickly hushed him as the whisk lifted itself back out again under the direction of her spell, settling once more on the butt of its handle. Subsiding, Kenyen watched.

Her gaze never left the larger bowl. The thick foam swirled around and around, gradually slowing. It then contracted abruptly. She heard a soft gasp from the Shifterai at her side but kept her gaze on the foam, which had formed an anvil shape very similar to a thunderhead cloud. It still moved slowly about the center of the cup, and was very close to that center. After a moment, it collapsed, turning soft and frothy, once more merely the foam found on top of properly whisked tea.

Sighing, Solyn nodded. "Two, three days at most, given the distance from the center, and from the size... two or three days of steady rain. We usually get one bad storm before the driest, hottest days of the high harvest season, but with the hills and mountains blocking full view of the horizon, a storm often rolls over us before we actually know. It's important to avoid harvesting the grain early; if it gets soaked in a heavy rain while it lies on the ground, instead of drying properly in the sun, the grain has to be abandoned. It cannot be stored."

"And so you use a special spell," Kenyen observed. He lifted his chin at the bowl. "What do you do with the leftover tea?"

She smiled. "We drink it, of course. Mascha tea is
never
wasted. It is picked from the youngest buds that have been carefully sheltered from direct sunlight, the buds gently harvested by hand, not by clipper. The leaves are dried flat in the shade, guarded against insects and animals until dry. Then the veins are carefully removed when they are crumbled, and the crumbles ground and sifted, thrice to honor Brother Moon for the main kind most people drink, and once more for Sister Moon, for the finest powdering which is used by the priesthood."

"This is Brother's Tea," she added, nodding at the vial of powder. "An expert maschen, a tea maker wise with many years of practice, can whip the froth without a spell and get a suggestion of the coming weather for the next few days. I don't have nearly that much practice at normal tea reading, but then I don't need to.
I
can use a divination spell and get more accurate results, making predictions up to a week in advance. It still takes practice to divine the
timing
of a coming storm, and its size, but then I've been doing it this way for a good five years now, more or less once a week."

"A handy trait. Most of the time we send fliers up into the sky every hour or so. You can see a very long ways on the Plains, and the weather rarely deviates from its course," he told her. "Every Family has shifters with bird shapes for reading the weather and sending messages to other places, even if they're not a part of Clan Bird. And those stuck on the ground learn to read the coming weather as well."

"Flying sounds like it would be rather handy for such things," she agreed. Since the foam was no longer remotely cloud-shaped, she poured half the tea from the larger bowl into the smaller bowl. Lifting it to her lips, she bowed her head for a moment in silent prayer, then drank the stimulating, bittersweet brew. Draining it to foam, she set the smaller bowl down and picked up the larger, pouring in the second half.

"My turn?" Kenyen asked, reaching for the bowl.

Shocked, Solyn quickly covered the drinking bowl with her fingers, shaking her head. "Oh, no, you mustn't!"

He gave her a puzzled look. "Why not? You said
we
drink it. Doesn't that both mean you and I?"

"Well, yes, but
not
from the same bowl," Solyn asserted, blushing. At his confused look, she blushed harder. "That's part of the marriage ceremony. And, well, I wasn't thinking, and only brought the one bowl."

Kenyen almost pointed out that he could easily use the larger bowl, but refrained. It was probably some custom thing unique to the Corredai, and it had been drummed over and over into his head as a warband member to always respect the customs of outkingdom peoples even if he didn't understand them.

"Alright, I won't drink it this time... but would it be acceptable for me to try it another time?" he asked her. "I do enjoy tea when I can get it, and I've obviously never tried maschen. I'll admit I'm curious to see what that tastes like. I can bring my own cup, next time."

"There's nothing wrong with curiosity," she agreed, smiling. "I'll bring a spare bowl tomorrow." Lifting the smaller bowl to her lips, she paused and added, "Maschen is never drunk from a cup, because a cup implies enough wealth to own several types of dishes."

"Oh?" Kenyen asked, curious. "Why is that?"

She nodded. "The ceremony is meant to be available to all who live in the mountains, from the king and queen themselves, who live in a rich castle surrounded by all manner of fine things, all the way down through to the poorest laborer, who lives communally in a hut with several others and only owns a single porridge bowl for eating—it is said that Cora Herself drinks the maschen of the Gods from a simple porridge bowl when She is alone, and only uses a golden one on Her holiest days."

She saluted him with the tea and drank. Kenyen nodded his head in return, silently thanking her for the lesson. He was in Correda, which meant respecting the local Goddess, but he did want to share a little bit of his own culture with her.

"Our own Gods, Father Sky and Mother Earth, have no special way of eating. But They do share Their bounty of rain and grain, milk and meat, with the highest and the lowest alike," he told her. "When we have a feast in the Family, everyone contributes something, even if all a person can afford is to haul a bucket of water from the nearest cistern, or help stoke the brazier fires for making tea—steeped tea leaves, not this whisked powder of yours."

Solyn nodded, draining the last of the tea. The stimulants from the first bowlful were already being felt, heightening her senses, sharpening her mind, and tingling through her blood. "Mm, steeped tea is very different from whisked tea. This is
much
stronger than steeping, and the flavor is different. The best maschen tea leaves are grown several valleys away—the kind preferred for Sister's Tea—but we do pick and process our own for Brother's Tea, locally. We don't
worship
the Moon Gods," she added. "The names just refer to the level of fineness in the grinding and sifting process, taking their numbers from the times each moon circles the world in a single season."

"We don't worship Them, either," he agreed. "But we do honor Them, as the visible children of Father Sky and Mother Earth."

"So what do you do for your own marriage customs?" Solyn asked him, curious.

"Well, just as you never drink from the same bowl as someone else," Kenyen lightly teased, "a maiden of the Plains is taught never to hold out her hand to a man on the opposite side of a fire, whether it's in the ground or in a brazier. Not even when requesting something. She holds it off to the side, or she walks around the fire to meet him, but she doesn't hold out her hand casually."

"You don't?" Solyn asked. "Er, I mean, she doesn't?"

"It's an invitation for the man to leap over the fire and catch her hand. That is how we marry, on the Plains," Kenyen explained. "In front of witnesses, of course."

Solyn gave him a puzzled look. "How odd... Ah, no offense meant."

"None taken," he allowed. He shrugged. "It's simply a different way. All systems are valid in the eyes of the Gods."

"It's just... so simple. There isn't a priest involved?" Solyn asked. He shook his head. She blinked and absorbed that, then shook her own. "Marriage maschen is prepared by a priest, here in the mountains, in front of a gathering of family, friends, members of the local holdings, everyone who can come. The groom provides the bowl and the bride provides the tea—the nicer the bowl, the better, for it proves how well he will be able to take care of her. There is also some symbolism in the colors, words, or images painted on the tea bowl, if any, and of course the material it is made out of has meaning as well.

"The bride usually provides Sister's Tea which she has made herself, or which a trusted female relative or friend has made—I had to learn how to make both kinds as part of my Healing lessons, since we use similar methods to refine other substances," she added. "It takes a lot of time and the finest of sifting cloths, usually silk, to make the highest grade of powder. The attention a woman gives to Sister's Tea indicates the attention she will give to the needs of her family. There is a lot of meaning behind the ceremony, and a lot of effort."

"I can see that. There is meaning behind our own ceremony as well, if not as much effort," he admitted. "As men are most often the shifters, we are said to rule everything in the air, the water, and the earth via the various animal shapes we can take. But women are the traditional keepers of the hearthfire, representing the fourth element. So a man must be courageous enough to brave the flames of the fourth element when leaping to his lady's side."

She smiled. "I like that. In our ceremony, fire is simply used for heating the water, though it also represents the magical element of fire.
We
don't go leaping over it," she teased, provoking a smile from him. "In the wealthiest families, special scented woods can be burned, and in winter, incense perfumes the air. In spring or summer, even the poorest family showers the couple with fragrant flower petals to invoke the scented blessings of the mountain winds. Earth is obviously represented by the cup, whether it's made from pottery, glass, or gold, and of course the tea represents water."

"So then what happens?" Kenyen asked her, curious. "The priest prepares the tea, the flame boils the water, the tea is whisked, and the air is perfumed... and... They just drink it?"

"They just drink it," she confirmed, grinning. "From the same bowl in which it is prepared, rather than a separate whisking bowl." She checked herself, amending, "Well, they also say, 'With this tea, I drink you into my life as my beloved groom.' Or 'my beloved bride' in your case as a man. The groom speaks and drinks first, one quarter of the tea. Then the bride speaks and drinks one third of what is left. The groom drinks half of the remainder, this time without words, and the bride drains the whole of what's left in the bowl."

"And then they are married?" he asked.

"The foam is first checked for augury by the priest—the priest usually keeps silent and speaks privately to the bride and groom later if anything needs mentioning. Silence doesn't have to mean something bad, just something private, so everyone assumes all tea-reading results are a good thing. The priest then blesses them, the witnesses cheer, and a feast is usually served," Solyn explained. "At the end of the feast, everyone helps one half of the newly married couple move their belongings into the other half's home.

"Often it's the bride moving into the groom's home, but sometimes it's the groom moving into the bride's, if her home is larger. Sometimes they stay with one or the other set of parents, particularly if that family needs the help, or they don't have the land or the wealth available to build their own home just yet," she said.

Kenyen rubbed his chin, absorbing her words. "So the one moves in with the other, which isn't so different from a maiden moving in with her mate. On the Plains, a man doesn't leap to a woman's side until he is wealthy enough to afford his own
geome
."

"Geome?"
Solyn asked, curious.

"It's the special kind of domed, lattice-walled tents that we use," he explained. "The maiden saves up her own wealth so she can afford a brazier at the very least, though a portable cookstove is preferred. And when we retire to the Shifting City each winter, the newly married couple usually get their own room in the tenements set aside for each Family. But that doesn't apply here. It's not at all the same. Traver doesn't have a
geome
, let alone a house to call his own."

"Well, Traver's family isn't as wealthy as my own," Solyn admitted, giving it some thought. "Technically, since I have my own bedchamber and Traver sleeps in an attic with his little brother, it would be expected for my family to accept him into our house, while we built up the funds to buy or build our own. As far as everyone is concerned, I'm still the Healer's daughter, which means I would inherit the house with its herb-room and such, so I would be expected to stay with my family, and my husband would stay with me.

"In fact, the night before the caravan left, Traver came and discussed such an arrangement with my parents, since I would need to stay near all the Healing supplies. At least until my training as a Healer is complete, then I'd be expected to find and settle somewhere that needs a Healer, unless the local one is very old. Which Mother isn't."

He could hear a hedge lurking in her tone and voiced it as a question. "However...?"

"However, I'm a mage. My magics aren't the kind that are very good at healing things, so I really
should
be sent to a city where I can learn from other mages," she reminded him. "A half-trained mage is a danger to herself and those around her. Particularly if I tried to experiment with the more complex spells without understanding the principles behind whatever magic I'm trying to effect—the more complex the spell, the more I have to understand it. Anyone can brew a pot of willow-bark tea for simple pain relief, but you don't want to try to mix up a truly complex posset for some ailment, the kind containing several different ingredients, without the right sort of training."