Dave Smeds - The Sorcery Within

For the first time, her father seemed worried. "Who?"

She shrugged, inwardly laughing at herself. "I don't know. He never told me his true name, I'm sure of that."

"What have you gotten yourself into, daughter?"

"He wasn't like anyone I'd ever seen before. He impressed me – the way you impress me, Papa. And he needed me, at least for a little while. I knew he wouldn't stay, but that didn't matter. I took what I could, and he loved me back as best he could. Preventing pregnancy was the last thing on my mind. I knew, if need be, I had amethery."

"But now you're not sure you want to use it."

"I don't want to raise a child alone, but I also don't want just any offspring. I don't know who Ethmurl really is, but he had something inside him that no boy of Garthmorron has to offer. This baby could be someone very special. That's my difficulty. If I conceived another dozen times, I might never produce a child to match the one in my womb now."

"Will the child exhibit the qualities of the father if he isn't present to raise it?"

"That's a long question, Papa. My short answer is: At least it will have a chance."

"Wait until Uncle Ossatch hears about this."

Her smile was involuntary. "I'm sure Uncle Ossatch will deny my adventurousness comes from his side of the family."

"At least I was able to do the honorable thing." Cosufier sighed. "This child of yours won't have that sort of buffer."

"I survived. So did you." However dull Garthmorron might have been, it had nurtured her.

"You want the child, then."

"I don't know, Papa. I really don't."

It took a few moments for it to sink in, then Cosufier suddenly stood up, adjusting his belt in a feigned attempt to seem casual. "Well, I have some chores I should be doing." But he only made it halfway to the door. "You know," he said finally, "your mother and I planned brothers and sisters for you, though we never had the chance to have them. I'm still young enough to enjoy being a surrogate father."

"Thank you, Papa."

"I'll see you in a few hours."

She kissed him and he was gone, leaving her stroking her abdomen and wondering if it would ever again be as flat and smooth as it was now.

A short while later, she poured a full cup of the tea – more than enough, she thought. She emptied the remainder of the pot onto the ground outside the back window, and set the cup on the windowsill to cool. It would be ready in a few minutes. By that time, she would have decided.

She climbed into the loft. She lay in her bed, which had never seemed too large until Ethmurl had left, and pulled out the scrap of doeskin she had hidden under her pillow, spreading it out on the bed to read the hastily scrawled ideograms of High Speech. She could have simply taken it from memory.

Lerina:

I leave like a thief in the night – because I could not face the hurt and judgment of your eyes. I cannot share with you the reasons why I leave, but believe me when I say that they have nothing to do with you. I said it once lightly, but now I repeat in sincerity: "Thou art the queen of all women." I love you.

– Ethmurl

With the note, he had left four jewels. She picked up the largest one. It glittered magnificently. She had never seen anything comparable, not even among the late Lady Dran's finery. If and when she ever needed to convert it into cash, she would receive enough to live on for several years, at a better standard than she was used to.

But at that moment, it had no allure. They were four rocks. Pretty, and precious to some, but nevertheless hard and giving no love nor warmth. What kind of legacy was that? She slipped her hand under her blouse and felt the area around her navel. It was warm, living, containing a potential for beauty unmatched by jewels.

She had made her decision. She wanted a better reminder of him than rocks.

She virtually sailed down the stairs from the loft. She would have to tell her father immediately; it wasn't fair to make him wait all day. She almost giggled at the expression she knew she'd soon see on Uncle Ossatch's face. But first, she turned to the windowsill to dump out the amethery.

The cup lay on its side, its contents dripping off the outer edge. Brows furrowed, she picked it up. It had a wide, flat bottom. Even a stiff breeze wouldn't have knocked it over, had there been one. Her father? Not like him.

Then she saw it. A tiny set of footprints led across the sill, etched with spilled tea, evaporating to nonexistence as she watched. She searched, but the rythni had gone, leaving no other traces.

As any Cilendri knew, a mother couldn't have asked for a better omen.

IT WASDARKNIGHT,the night on which neither the sun, nor its sister, nor Motherworld, nor any of the moons were in the sky. It was a time when the gods withdrew their surveillance, when the forces of the supernatural were unbound, and when men conducted those rites that needed power to sanctify. Across the face of Tanagaran, every culture maintained its superstitions and observances concerning Dark Night, and Alemar and Elenya were prey to old beliefs and childhood myths. This was the moment when the face of the world they knew turned its back on its mother planet and Achird, the sun, away from its origin and its foundation, and looked out at the immensity. Here in the desert, the magnificent clarity of the dry, high altitude cast jewels in the ebony ceiling above. The air lived. Existence never seemed so limitless, and man so small.

A knot of Zyraii surrounded them, but despite the presence of humanity, Alemar and Elenya felt the loneliness and desolation of the land, a sensation that had not truly left them since they had separated to observe the first section of thepulstrall. The beauty and the terror of the wasteland once again stole their equilibrium.

They had reached the end. They had spent their time alone and had all returned, some worse for wear, but alive, to endure the other tests. They had proved their knowledge of the blade and rope; they had broken oeikani; they had recited the laws of the So-de'es from memory. Now on the eighth night, one ritual remained.

At a word, the youths were formed into a long line. Ahead of them stood the Menhir of T'lil, flanked by three large fires. Wood fires. The stone was something of an enigma, a chunk of rugged, convoluted rock possessing glints of metal ores. It reached shoulder height, half as wide as it was tall, nestled in the midst of the fine sand that bordered the palms and grasses of the oasis of Shom. No rock of this type existed elsewhere in Zyraii. It was the most valuable of all T'lil relics. The oasis was the center of their territory; no member of another tribe would be permitted here while a T'lil lived to defend it. Alemar knew this was no boast. The menhir, in a sense, gave this Zyraii tribe their everlasting souls, and there was no physical object more precious to them.

Wilan took to his position directly in front of the stone, facing the line of boys.

"Ai Nannon!"Wilan cried.

"Ai Nannon!"the boys echoed.

Behold God! A phrase spoken only on Dark Night.

"Nannon welcomes you to the Bu," Wilan said. His voice carried such impact that it rode over the detachment Elenya and Alemar normally felt listening to the Zyraii language. Even words that they scarcely understood moved them. "You have all done well. It is time for the final acknowledgment of your new status."

The old man looked down the line – about twenty boys, all afraid. The adults took up stations at either end of the line. The youths eyed them nervously.

One of the priests stepped to center stage. He reached to a tiny scabbard on his belt and withdrew a shiny, very wicked-looking instrument. The blade was shorter than the handle and was shaped like a fork. The outer edges were dull; only the insides of the prongs were meant to cut. The man raised it above his head and waved it once, slowly, across the boys' range of vision.