Dave Duncan - Children of Chaos

He liked that less, for he was a clever man. The balance of his mind swung back toward death and horror. "Then you can aid my foes."

"I have said we shall not."

"By remaining silent you can aid them."

"To tell everything that may be relevant would take forever. Do you want sixty-sixty sisters babbling in your ears all day long? Ask if a man is a traitor and we shall tell you, but we shall not warn. Only holy Mayn knows all. Those are my terms. Accept them or slay us."

Stralg had hesitated, angrily weighing compromise against massacre. Then, impatient and flushed with victory, he had accepted her terms. He had never gotten around to imposing others, and while the concessions she had won were almost meaningless, she was probably the only person who had ever made that monster back up even a hairsbreadth.

So the vile bargain had been made. So an organization made up mostly of nosy old women had become the despot's sharpest weapon. Until Stralg, the Fist of Weru had been a figurehead with no practical authority over Werists outside his own city or district, and any previous bloodlord who had tried to widen his rule had died young. The seers had helped Stralg win supreme power over the whole Face, and they had helped him keep it, betraying countless rebels to his awful vengeance. Always the rationalization had been that they were biding their time until he could be overthrown, but that time had never come and never would until Stralg's black heart stopped beating.

The Eldest had made her decision long ago and to change it now would be to admit failure. She knew that mutiny smoldered under the ancient crust of obedience, but she must choose a successor who would follow the course she had mapped out, who would write the same story upon the next tablet. LeAmber, she decided, was the one. LeAmber was young, true, not even fifty yet, but she would do nothing foolish. She would wait out the bloodlord's death.

The alternative to LeAmber was Tranquility. Tranquility was older, but rash; she would raise up the Witnesses to defy Stralg and so risk everything. Tranquility's faction maintained that the evil was more than Stralg, that chthonic powers more dreadful than even Weru stood behind him, and the terrible thing he had built would live on even after he died. The Eldest had refused to accept that argument, for there was no evidence that the man's sister was a Chosen of Xaran. There never could be real evidence, and Maynists must deal in facts, not theories or pseudoprophecy.

The sunlight had moved. Her hand must come soon or be too late. The refectory was a blur now, as the shadows closed in. Most of her was dead already.

And yet... when there were no facts? If the gods refused certainty, then must not mortals sometimes act on partial knowledge, weighing possibilities and calculating uncertainties? If the Witnesses were ever to renege on their pact, then now was the time, for Stralg was aging, he was far away on the Florengian Face, still striving to conquer it as he had conquered Vigaelia. After fifteen years, success was souring into defeat. If LeAmber was wrong and Tranquility right, then now was the time to abrogate the treaty. Was this an eldest's legendary dying insight, or only the maundering of a dying crone? Had she been wrong all these years? Must humanity ever be stretched upon the same rack, with a succession of different sandals on the levers?

Softly the five of her hand had come. They gathered around in silence, kneeling by the bed, hands joined with hers for comfort, and she knew them: Rose, Indigo, Carillon, Cinnamon, and Willowbark. Two of them were almost as old as herself, while Willowbark was barely forty. They were united in their grief. Sorrow poured through their union until the Eldest's blind old eyes filled with tears. They shared the pain, knowing that her essence now was death.

"Can you speak, Mother?" Rose whispered. "Have you some special word for us? Will the lady of Wisdom speak with your final breath?"

Of course she would! The Eldest wondered how she could not have realized sooner that she had a message to pass on. "A weft," she said, "tonight, a weft!" She felt their dismay when they could not see what was so plain to her.

In any attempt to explain to extrinsics how they sensed the world, Maynists were forced to speak in metaphor. They spoke of weaving, of mosaics, of patterns. They talked of nodes, of cusps, of subtle touches on the tiller by which the gods steered the world—the single snowflake that could launch an avalanche, the sensual moment when a husband turned to his wife in the quiet of the night and sired a great teacher or a monster, while on some other night she might have conceived a different child for him. They took special delight in identifying what they termed a weft, by which they meant an important event, action, or decision that ultimately produced results contrary to its original intent. The analogy, of course, was to the weft thread in a weaving, which turns at the edge and goes back in the opposite direction to make the pattern.

Rose said, "Tonight? What is its nature?"

"She is leaving!" The Eldest struggled and found enough breath to whisper, "His sister... going to ... Tryfors ..."

"Sister? But where did this weft occur, Mother? Tell us!"

Why could they not see for themselves? "Skjar."

Ripples of content... No matter how important this weft, Skjar was too distant for any Witness here in Bergashamm to scent it. But the local chapter would send in its report and the data would be woven into the history so that all could know. The incident must be great indeed if the lady of wisdom Herself deemed it worthy of mention.

The Eldest sensed another presence. The Ancient One had come for her, and it was time to go.

"We are humbled and will record it, Mother." That was Cinnamon, pushing herself forward as usual. "But who will be Her voice to us from now on? Say the name, Mother! Who will be our new Eldest?"

LeAmber, and keep the covenant? Wait for the tyrant to fall?

Or Tranquility? Warn them of the greater darkness behind Stralg? Tranquility's faction would provoke the tyrant's wrath. Must the Eldest admit that she had been wrong all her life? No, not that. That weft tonight would' save her from that shame.

"LeAmber," she whispered.

She felt their anger and dismay like physical blows.

How dare they question her and delay her here when she must be gone? How could they not sense that the Old One was standing over them, waiting for her?

"Did you say 'LeAmber,' Mother?"

Yes. They would feel her insistence. Of course it must be LeAmber! The compact must be preserved.

Now she could go. Now she had done. Relieved at last of her burdens, Witness Raven, the Eldest, sank into the gentle arms of the mother.

five

FRENA WIGSON

was driving her chariot down a long hillside, hooves drumming, wheels bouncing, axle squealing, leather floor squeaking. She clutched the reins in one hand and the rail in the other and let her knees absorb whatever jostling and bouncing was not stopped by the webbing. That was the theory; in practice she was going up and down like laundry in a water trough. The wheels leaped from ridge to ridge and the wind whirled her hair like a flag. Exhilaration!

"What village is that ahead?" She had to shout very loud.

Verk yelled back, "Bitterfeld, mistress. A very forgettable place."

There were few things more enjoyable in life than driving a pair of strong young onagers on a fine morning and letting the wind blow your hair around—assuming you had hair suitable for the purpose—but it was not the best situation for conversation. On a smooth track, yes, but there was no real track at all through these hills. Travel was very educational.