Melanie Rawn: The Diviner

“You won’t forget about the inks?”

“I won’t forget.”

When he was alone, Qamar unstoppered several bottles and picked up a fresh pen. With the portrait flat atop the green book, he began designing the border. Talishann after talishann, elegant and potent, gradually framing one side, then two, then three. He kept glancing into his own eyes, and smiling. He took up a finer pen and traced barely visible symbols into the subtle shadows on his clothing, entwined them in the lines of his sash. Only a little while until dawn, only a little while before he would be able to fulfill the mission with which Acuyib had entrusted him, for which he alone had the daring and ambition—

He shook off the momentary dizziness and dipped his pen once more in black ink. Another talishann, and another, along the bottom of the portrait now, adding one to each side so that soon they would meet in the middle and only one would be left, the one he would seal with his blood. Connected through the flowing lines of interwoven symbols, through the fibers of the paper saturated with inks forming his own image—

Perhaps it was the magic, awakening. He would sense the power, feel it, of course he would—he was kindling magic such as no Shagara had ever dared do before, no wonder he was growing dizzy—but in a few moments he would feel other things, he would feel younger, the aches in his fingers and knees gone, and the gray would vanish from his hair and all the lines from his face, not that any of that was important, not really, not compared to the work he would use these coming years to accomplish—his selfishness had ended up having a greater purpose, just as Azzad’s and Alessid’s individual desires had resulted in so much that they had not envisioned—they had changed their worlds, and he would do the same, only he would not have to kill anyone to do it—people would live, they would understand, they would spend their lives in peace, and surely his desire for more years than his kind could expect was a small thing to exchange for what he would tell them, what he would make them understand—

The breath was rasping in his throat. The edges of his vision were turning black, black as the ink staining his fingers, he couldn’t find the little knife he’d intended to use to prick up drops of his blood and so he used the sharp point of the pen—dug it into his thumb—squinted to see that crimson dripped thick onto the last talishann the one that meant life—

He thought he heard Solanna’s voice, through the screen of willow branches he could no longer see, and tried to call out to her that it was all right, everything would be perfect from now on, they would have years and years together, that she was right and he would grow old and there would be lines on his face.

His lips would not move. His head would not turn. He felt a great wrenching pain, heard a shrieking as of a furious storm, and knew nothing more.

She sat with the green book on her knees and the portrait of her husband smooth and beautiful atop it. Nissim had told her what most of the talishann meant. She had looked up the others in the book. She had taken all day to do it. With the battle raging over the hill, a battle for which she cared not at all, she had nothing else to do.

Which of the Tza’ab had betrayed the Sheyqa, which had stayed loyal to the Empress, and which had decided to fight on the side of their new land, she did not know. Which Joharrans and Cazdeyyans and Qayshi and Shagarrans and all the confused clutter of soldiers had fought with or against or for each other, she did not know. She was certain nobody else knew, either. Those who survived would tell whatever tale would allow their continued survival. They would go home and brag about their courage, their cleverness. Someone would end up taking the credit. It didn’t matter. They would all go on fighting each other until someone emerged who was strong enough to make them stop.

Qamar had thought to do that. She had read it in the first few pages of the book.

Each people belongs to its own land by virtue of oneness with the air they breathe, the water they drink, the soil that grows their food. Over the generations the land hallows their blood. Their blood spilled in its defense hallows the land. And when this has happened, they are the land’s, and the land is theirs. No one may come to claim it who is not willing to live on and with and for it, to take it into his blood and be willing to give that blood back in its defense.

So you must understand the madness, the fatal madness, of believing that to stand in a field means you own that field. That to build a palace on a hill means you own that hill. That to construct a bridge across a river means you own that river. It is not until the field and the hill and the river own you that balance is achieved.

How futile it is, how fatal, to make war for land that is not your own.

“Solanna? I’ve found the boy.”

Miqelo’s voice made her glance around. It was growing dark now. She had been staring at her husband’s face for many hours. Perhaps the battle was over. Probably it was. She didn’t care. “And?”

“He was coming here anyway. Qamar promised him the inks.”

“Did he.” She looked down at the case that she had repacked, all the bottles with their carved stone stoppers nestled neatly together, the extra loose papers folded atop them. “Take them. He can have them.”

“Perhaps you might want to talk to him. He’s a Grijalva, after all.”

“Yes, you already said. It may be that he and I shall meet one day. But not this day, Miqelo. I’ve changed my mind. Not this day.”

She returned her gaze to her husband’s beautiful face as Miqelo came inside the green canopy of willow leaves and picked up the inks, took them away to give to the young Grijalva who had all unknowing helped Qamar do this incredible, insane thing. Not the thing he had intended, of course. But it had happened all the same.

“Did you think you could stop a war?” she asked the portrait. “Did you truly think that? Did you think that if you showed them what was possible—” Her gaze flickered to the talishann so finely drawn, so thick around the borders of the page. Life. Youth. Health. Strength . A dozen more, repeated again and again, signs that originated with the Shagara in his desert homeland and variations discovered by the Shagara in their mountain fortress. The scents of the paper and the inks were still discernable, some of them still pungent. Many of them he had learned from his fellow Haddiyat. Some of them . . . some of them he had learned from her.

“Did you think,” she resumed softly, “to show them the power of this land? And that they could not hope to conquer it, but only to become in time a part of it? That, Acuyib and Claydann and their great game aside, it is the Mother who gives, and the Son who defends?”

She saw her hand tremble slightly as a fingertip traced one of the talishann. There was the faintest tinge of dark crimson to the ink, telling her that this had been the last, the one drawn with his blood. Life .

Eiha, he lived. Just not in the way he’d intended.

A perfect likeness, his inks on his paper, though drawn by a hand not his own; sealed with Shagara symbols and Shagara blood. Youth. Health. Time. Strength. Safety. Permanence. Life . Woods and herbs and flowers and water had intensified the meanings of the talishann, amplified the potency of his blood. The magic had done what he had insisted it do, in the only way it could.

Just not in the way he’d intended.

Opening the book, she used a knife to slit the inside back cover. She wasted another moment looking at the portrait, then slid a protective sheet of paper across it and carefully slid both pages between the leather and the wooden backing. She would glue it closed later. It would be safe enough for now.