Robert Silverberg - At Winter's End

“It can’t be.”

“Step inside my spirit for a moment and feel what I feel, and you’ll know the truth.”

Hresh said, agitated, “Let me go for Torlyri.”

“No! Not Torlyri!”

“She knows the healing arts.”

“I’m aware of that, boy. I’m not interested in having her practice her arts on me.”

Hresh crouched before her and tried to look her in the face, but she would not meet his eyes.

“Koshmar, no! No! You’re still strong. You can be healed, if you’ll only allow—”

“No.”

“Does Torlyri know how sick you are?”

Koshmar shrugged. “How can I say what Torlyri knows or does not know? She’s a wise woman. I’ve never spoken of this with anyone. Certainly not with her.”

“How long have you been like this?”

“Some time,” said Koshmar. “It has come upon me slowly.” Now she did raise her head, and summoned some of the vigor that once had been hers. In a louder voice she said, “But I didn’t summon you here to talk about my health.”

Angrily Hresh shook his head. “I know some healing arts myself. If you don’t want Torlyri to know, fine. Torlyri doesn’t have to know a thing. But let me cast the disease from you. Let me invoke Mueri and Friit and do what you need to have done for you.”

“No.”

“No?”

“My time has come, Hresh. Let it be as it must be. I won’t be leaving Vengiboneeza when the tribe departs.”

“Of course you will, Koshmar.”

“I command you to cease telling me what I will do!”

“But how can we leave you behind?”

“I will be dead,” Koshmar said. “Or nearly so. You will say the death-words over me and you will put me in a peaceful place, and then you will all march away. Is that understood, Hresh? It is my last order, that the tribe is to go forth from this city. But I give it knowing that I will not be among you when you leave. You have spent your entire life disobeying me, but perhaps this one time you’ll grant me the right to have my own wishes followed. I want no grief and I want no noise made over me. I am at the limit-age; I am at my death-day.”

“If only you would tell me what troubles you, so that I could do a healing—”

“What troubles me, Hresh, is being alive. The cure will soon be offered me. One more word from you of this sort and I’ll dismiss you from your post, while I’m still chieftain. Will you be quiet now? There are things I must tell you before I lose the strength.”

“Go on,” Hresh said.

“The journey the tribe will be taking will be a very long one. That I foresee with death-wisdom, that it will carry you to the far places of the world. You can’t make such a journey bearing everything on your backs, as we did when we came here from the cocoon. Go to the Bengs, Hresh, and ask them for four or five young vermilions to be beasts of burden for us. If they are our friends, as they claim so loudly to be, then they’ll give them. If they won’t give them to you, then ask Torlyri to have her Beng lover steal some, and so be it. Be sure that the ones you get are both male and female, so that in times to come we can propagate our own.”

Hresh nodded. “That shouldn’t be very difficult.”

“No, not for you. Next: there must be a new chieftain. You and Torlyri will choose her. You should pick someone fairly young, and strong-willed, and strong-bodied as well. She will have to guide the tribe through many difficult years.”

“Is there anyone you would suggest, Koshmar?”

Koshmar contrived a flickering smile. “Ah, Hresh, Hresh, you are sly to the end! With such respect you ask the dying Koshmar to make the choice, when I know already that the choice is made!”

“I asked you in all honor, Koshmar.”

“Did you, now? Well, then: I answer you as you ask, and tell you what you already know. There’s only one woman of the tribe who is of the proper age and the proper strength of mind. Taniane is to succeed me.”

Hresh once again caught his breath, and bit his lip, and looked away.

“Does the choice displease you?”

“No. Not at all. But it makes what’s happening more real. It makes me see more clearly than I would like to that you’ll no longer be chieftain, that someone else, that Taniane—”

“Everything changes, Hresh. The sapphire-eyes no longer rule the world. Now, a third thing: will you and Taniane be mated?”

“I’ve been searching in the chronicles for precedent that would allow the old man of the tribe to take a mate.”

“No need for further searching. No need for precedent. You are the precedent. She is your mate.”

“Is she, then?”

“Bring her to me when you return from the Beng settlement, and I will say the words.”

“Koshmar, Koshmar—”

“But tell her nothing about the chieftainship. It is not hers yet, not until you and Torlyri bestow it on her. These things must be done properly. There can be no new chieftain while the old one is still alive.”

“Let me try to heal you, Koshmar.”

“You annoy me. Go to the Bengs and beg some vermilions of them, boy.”

“Koshmar—”

“Go!”

“Allow me to do one thing for you, at least.” With fumbling fingers Hresh unfastened some small object that he had around his throat, and pressed it into her hand. “This is an amulet,” he said, “that I took from Thaggoran as he lay dead after the rat-wolves attacked us. It is very ancient, and it must have some strong powers, though I have never been able to learn what they are. When I feel that I need Thaggoran beside me, I touch the amulet, and his presence is close. Keep it in your hand, Koshmar. Let Thaggoran come to you and guide you to the next world.” He folded her fingers about it. It was hard-edged and warm against her palm. “He had great love and respect for you,” Hresh said. “He told me that many times.”

Koshmar smiled. “I thank you for this amulet, which I will keep by me until the end. And then it is yours again. You will not be long deprived of it, I think.” She gestured impatiently. “Go, now. Go to the Bengs and ask them for a few of their beasts. Go. Go, Hresh.” Then, softening, she touched her hand to his cheek. “My old man. My chronicler.”

Noum om Beng appeared to have been expecting him. At least, he showed no surprise when Hresh appeared, breathless, sweaty, having come at a trot all the way from his own tribe’s settlement to the Beng village at Dawinno Galihine. The old Helmet Man was in his bare stark chamber, sitting facing the entrance as though anticipating the arrival of a visitor.

A remorseless hammering pounded Hresh’s skull from within. His soul was aching from too great a buffeting within too small a compass. His mind whirled from all that had happened in these past few frantic days. And now he must come before old Noum om Beng in what would probably be his final opportunity to speak with him, and there was so much yet to learn. The questions kept multiplying; the answers only retreated.

“Sit,” Noum om Beng said, pointing to a place beside him on his stone bench. “Rest. Draw breath, boy. Take the air far down into yourself. Take it deep.”

“Father—”

“Rest!” said Noum om Beng sharply. Hresh thought he was going to strike him, as he had so often in the early days of his tutelage. But the old man remained perfectly still. Only his eyes moved, compelling Hresh to motionlessness with a steely glare.

Slowly Hresh drew in his breath, held it, released it, breathed again. In a little while the pounding of his heart diminished and the storm in his mind showed signs of dying down. Noum om Beng nodded. Quietly he said, “When do you leave the city, boy?”

“A day or two more.”

“Have you learned all you need to know here, then?”