Heretic

Part Two

Chapter 5

With both moons shining from half their faces and a sky covered in stars overhead, the night was bright enough to see by. An hour before midnight, Isaand whispered for Vehx to stay and watch over Ylla and received a grudging agreement in response. Then he slipped out of the hut and into the warm night air.

Isaand had spent most of the day sleeping, recovering from the use of his miracles. His legs still felt a bit leaden and he tucked his cloak tight around him to stave off the breeze, but otherwise he was much recovered. He made swift time across the bridge and into the main village, where the standing stones of Ulm-Etha were lit by torches whose flames fluttered sideways with the wind. They were the only lights to be seen, and they made the shadows of the stones stretch out darkly towards the sacrificial altar at the center. A slender form disentangled itself from the darkness and strode towards Isaand, making him clutch his bonewood staff at the ready. Had the village cleric been warned about him?

“Peace, friend.” The figure spoke in a soft voice, and as it drew closer Isaand saw a familiar tall and lean female form, hands clasped behind her back, her grinning teeth glinting in the moonlight. “It struck me after I left you this morning that assuming you could reach the Well on your own was perhaps a bit optimistic. You’ll find no convenient ferry passage there, and certainly not at night.”

“Ratha,” Isaand said, relieved. “You’re a welcome sight. I feared I’d have to swim.” He jested, but he could not deny he’d had his concerns. His only plan was to borrow a boat for the night, figuring out how to operate it through sheer persistence, and hope he could return it by morning before it was believed stolen.

“You look much better now that you’re not half-drowned and fighting to keep your eyes open,” Ratha teased. She looked much changed herself. She’d swapped out her lake-town dress for more typical island attire. She wore a pair of short trousers of thin tan material that ended just below her knees, with a short loose skirt hung over it, dyed orange. A strip of more tan cloth covered her breasts, with a vest the same color as her skirt open atop it, long draw-strings hanging loose to her waist. Her bare waist was as flat and smooth as he’d imagined, except for a small scar running from navel halfway around her waist, old and faded to white. Her feet were bare.

“And you look well-suited to the task of escort. Have you a boat nearby?” he asked.

“I borrowed my kin’s for the night. He scarcely needs it. The coward has vowed not to wet so much as his toes in the lake until the Lsetha has been driven away. He and his children are fortunate I’m willing to make the trip to town to trade for them.” Casually, Ratha took his arm and they began to stroll down the hill towards what passed for the harbor. Isaand smiled at that, and it seemed the night grew a bit warmer. Whatever he learned at this heretic’s meeting, this evening would not be a waste in such company.

“You do not fish, then?” Isaand asked.

“Why, did you hope to see me swim? I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I have no more desire to tempt fate than my cousin. I did learn to fish and steer a boat when I was young, but these past five years I’ve made my living other ways. Most of the lake-dwellers don’t care to visit the town, where they’re seen as ignorant bumpkins. I grew up there, though, so I buy and sell and flit back and forth by ferry. I’ve gone beyond as well. Lake Maenis is beautiful, but a woman grows bored sleeping and rising in the same place day after day.”

“Where have you been? I’ve come eastward, from Warana.”

“I’ve been there. The people are suspicious and quarrelsome, and each tribe warned me against the next, each one claiming they’d rob and violate me as soon as look at me,” Ratha said cheerfully. “In truth, I found it hospitable. They have a goddess there, some great wolf, who watches over and protects travelers, so I was never in any danger that I spotted. Though I suppose the same may not be said for you.”

“No,” Isaand said, thinking back with a sigh. “Hospitable is not the word I’d choose.”

“That girl with you… Ylla? She’s one of the grasslanders, is she not? How’d she come to travel with you?”

Isaand hesitated. Ratha was charming and refreshingly amiable, but the habit of mistrust ran deep in him by now. “I… healed her. Much like you saw this morning. After that, she could not remain in her home, so she follows me. In truth, I do not know what to do with her. She can hardly be my apprentice, but I know not what other life could be found for her.”

“There are always possibilities, so long as you keep your mind open. The people here have no idea who she is, and most never think beyond the lake’s shore. Our gods are quieter than most, and our clerics are far from bloodthirsty. She could be welcomed here, I think, so long as she had someone to speak for her. Apostates are not so rare.” The confidence in Ratha’s voice was intoxicating. If only it could be that easy.

“Not rare, perhaps, but never do they go unnoticed. I saved Ylla’s life. I will not let her end up on a cleric’s slab.”

“A city, then, that’s what you need. I’ve never been myself, but I’ve heard thousands of apostates live in Ethka. I’d love to see it, someday. It’s hard to imagine, so many people, even if you lived there you’d turn in the street and see strangers all around you. You could get up every morning and go the whole day seeing no one you knew.”

“Is that so appealing?” Isaand asked, surprised at the longing in her tone. “Lonely is the word I’d use.”

“One man’s loneliness is another woman’s solitude,” she joked, with a squeeze of his arm.

“You don’t strike me as a woman who seeks solitude.”

“You might be surprised, Isaand Laeson. You’ve scarcely known me an hour. From one traveler to another: people are rarely so simple as they seem on the surface. Ah, and here we are.”

With a shock, Isaand realized they had reached the docks already. The time had seemed much shorter than the climb up had been. A dozen boats floated, tied to poles driven into the side of the cliffs. Ratha stretched out with a foot and pulled one closer, holding it for him to enter. Isaand felt clumsy as he stepped down into the boat and set it to rocking. He settled down at the stern, his back to the walled off section where fish were stored after being caught. His boot caught on a pair of fishing spears left on the deck, sending them sliding.

Ratha hopped into the boat gracefully, and leaned past him to untie the boat. Isaand felt until he found one of the boats paddles, eager to assist. Ratha took the other and they began to propel the boat away from the island, her motions practiced and elegant. Isaand did his best to follow her lead.

The moon and starlight seemed to seep into the clear water, making the distant floor glow, cut with thousands of jet silhouettes of fish and eels swimming below. A pod of floating graspers went by beneath them, their billowing bodies glowing with a soft green light that lit the sides of the boat. With the water so clear, Isaand could almost believe their boat was floating on the open air. The soft sound of their paddles on the water was hypnotic, and he felt the last of the tension drain away from his shoulders.

“Your home is truly beautiful,” Isaand said. “When I was young, my tribe traveled constantly. We had no land of our own, you see, and had to keep on the move to avoid antagonizing the locals. We never slept in the same place for more than three nights, and each new day was a whole new world to explore. It was mostly grasslands, greener than Warana, like an endless plain of jade, and in the spring a million flowers would bloom and turn the ground into a myriad colors from horizon to horizon. There were forests, too, deep and dark, with thick fog that would come in the mornings and turn the other children into ghosts at a distance. We would hide and stalk each other in the mist, and climb trees to look out over the canopy. Even the deserts held a stark sort of beauty. I’d seen much of the world by the time I was a man, so it is nice to see that there are still places that can take my breath away.” He looked to Ratha, but her expression was guarded.

“Is that why you’re a heretic? Because your tribe were nomads, with no gods of their own?” she asked.

“No gods? You’ve got it backwards.” Memories flooded back, of men and women and children gathered around the bonfire in the cold night, singing and dancing with wooden masks bearing the faces of myriad gods. “We had too many. The Aislin tribe were a queer sort of apostates. We had no liege god, true, but we swore fealty and respect to every god and goddess whose lands we crossed. Tyrant or benefactor, it made no matter, the bards venerated them all. We collected stories and truths from each people we met, and passed them down to each of the tribe’s children. By the time I was fifteen, I knew the names of a hundred deities, and counted each one of them in my prayers. None of them answered though. None of them cared.”

“What happened?” Ratha asked. She had stopped rowing, and the night was silent except for the gentle lapping of water against the side of the bow.

“They called it the Bleaching Plague. I know not which god saw fit to bestow it upon us, but I have no doubt at its miraculous nature. What sort of natural sickness spreads through speech? Everyone who spoke to another infected them, and their skin began to pale, their hair going as white as snow, even their eyes grew lighter. Those infected had trouble staying warm, their bodies wracked by shudders and shivers, and as it grew worse their limbs began to numb, until they could no longer walk or control their fingers. They did not die, though.” Isaand let out a laugh like a rasp of rusty metal on stone. “The gods were merciful. The afflicted lived on, suffering, useless, nothing but a burden to their loved ones, forbidden from speaking lest they curse their caretakers. Few of them lasted long, though. The nomadic life is not easy for those who cannot walk or work, and no one wishes to live out their days watching those around them serve in silent resentment. Most walked away on stumbling feet, into the grass, and no one followed them, though they knew what it meant.”

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Ratha hesitated, then reached out, putting her fingers on the skin of his arm. Against his cool flesh, her fingers felt feverish. “As you did?”

“I was trained by the master bard Teraandis Aislin Ulaadottr. I never was good at keeping my mouth shut. My brothers and sisters, they were good to me, but I was scared I would forget myself one day, and curse them all. So before my legs became useless, I set out, with this staff you see here to help keep me up. I had some half-baked plan to reach the nearest tribe, to seek out a Lector or Paladin and beg for their god’s aid. As though they would have bothered. Instead, Szet found me.”

“The Unbound,” Ratha said, drawing in breath as her hand went to the wooden amulet at her chest.

“Yes. A god I sought, and a god did help me. Though not as I expected.”

“You’ve said more than a mouthful, already. Should I expect my own skin to start to lighten?” Ratha asked. Her tone was light, yet her lips made a tight line across her face.

“You need not fear. Szet’s power keeps the plague at bay. I cannot spread it. It grows worse when I exert myself, but a bit of rest and before long I am well again.” Though never fully.

“You serve him, why does he not heal you? The Unbound are not limited as other gods, what good does it do to keep your illness and force you to keep suffering from it?”

Isaand shook his head. “Szet does not heal wounds wholesale. He believes that to undo pain and injury robs people of their experiences. It is through hardship that we grow and become stronger. A lack of consequences breeds complacency, laziness, and eventually ingratitude. It’s harsh, but ultimately, we’re the better for it.”

“So all clerics claim, when asked why there is so much evil in the world. Good cannot exist without the bad to offset it. The gods are good, but it is only their wicked children who misbehave. Humans cannot be free without the right to commit cruelty.” Ratha spat out of the side of the boat into the lake, shaking her head angrily. “Sometimes I think they are all just excuses the gods tell us, to cover the fact that they messed it all up. They blame us for our mistakes, but they’re the ones who made us in the first place, are they not? If a boat sinks because it hasn’t been waterproofed, it’s the boat-maker’s fault, not the boat’s.”

“The world is a broken place,” Isaand agreed. “But it does no good to rage about it. The gods will never fix their mistakes so long as they can go on ignoring them, so long as men and women accept them as their superiors. The only hope is to change them.”

“Change the gods?” Ratha asked, rowing again. “How could we possibly hope to do that?”

Isaand hesitated, thinking back to that night in the deep cave, Szet’s voice filling his ears. He thought of the months he’d traveled since, all the men and women he’d healed, the threats he’d faced. The words were on his lips, but he hesitated, and the moment was lost. Silence stretched towards awkwardness.

“Well, you’re certain to hit it off with Hahmn,” Ratha said, her tone forcibly light. “He likes nothing more than a bit of philosophizing. I think he brings it out in me as well. We’ll be there soon. The Well is isolated, but not far.”

“This Hahmn,” Isaand asked. “He’s the Lector? What is he to you?” Mentor, friend? Lover?

“A fascinating man. Much the same as you, Isaand. He told me to watch for you, when I set out for Merasca two days ago.”

“You knew I was coming?” Isaand asked, startled.

“Oh, aye, though I hardly expected to see you wielding the power of an Unbound within hours of our meeting. His goddess told him you’d come, and he asked me to speak with you, to bring you together. He does not like to leave his island. And he knew I’d be interested.”

“Why so? Are you a follower of this Unbound goddess too? That necklace you wear, is it her symbol?” That thought was disquieting. The life of a heretic was dangerous enough without wearing a blasphemous symbol out in the open for all to see.

“Oh no, I’m a good and loyal worshiper of sweet Maesa and solid Ulm-Etha,” Ratha said with a laugh. “And so do I burn monthly offerings to the Child of Sand in the lake-town, before the clerics’ sight. Being faithful is easy, and the benefits one reaps are no small matter. Your Aislin tribe had the right idea, I think, Isaand. But Hahmn’s goddess intrigues me, as does your own Szet.”

She smiled then, her eyes twinkling with starlight. “A trader learns to consider all wares carefully before she makes her decision. I can see no reason why it should not be the same with gods.”

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The unsanctified island known as the Well was such an ordinary sight that Isaand missed it until Ratha pointed it out. It did not thrust up from the lake like the other islands, nor was it large. Beneath the lake it was shaped like a tower, but it the black basalt fell away up in the air, transitioning into a sand and dirt mound about a hundred strides across, roughly circular. Yet there was no inviting shore to make it an appealing stop for fisherman either. The shore was rough, sloping up and backwards to create a difficult climb, the edge ringed by thick grass with sharp edges, roots hanging out of the dirt beneath it. A few trees leaned out over the water, out of reach.

Ratha made for the far side of the island, sweeping around a spot where the island rose ten feet high in a rough mound. Along the other side, numerous spars of black stone pierced up from the water, making it a difficult approach, but Ratha steered the boat through them until it brushed up against the side. She reached inside a dark hole and drew out a length of rope which she used to secure the boat, then stood and smiled silently down at him. Isaand held his words. Their approach had the air of ritual to it, and he did not want to spoil the atmosphere. He stood up, the boat rocking wildly under him, and regained his balance against the side of the island.

Ratha reached up and took hold of something too dark to see, and then she was scrambling up, using hidden hand-and-foot-holds to reach flat ground. She spun around, lying on her belly, and reached down to give Isaand a hand up. He threw his staff up first, took her warm hand, and pulled himself, grunting in exertion.

The island was no more magnificent from above. Roughly sloping land spread off to either side, with the mound on the eastern shore being the only notable high spot. Moonlight glinted on rough stones sticking out of bare dunes among clumps of grass and small trees. Before he had much time to look, Ratha took his arm again and pulled him in a trotting pace towards the center of the island, where he could see the glow of the stars reflected in water.

A pond appeared in the middle of the island, no more than ten strides across, but just as he’d been told, its water was murky and opaque. He had grown so used to the glass-like water of the lake that the sight of ordinary water was almost a shock.

“It goes down, far below the lake’s bottom,” Ratha whispered. “I tried to dive down and touch the bottom, but I ran out of breath long before I reached it.”

“Maesa cannot touch it, can she?” Isaand asked. “It must have already been claimed.”

“That is correct, young Lector.” A voice boomed out, deep and fatherly. Isaand turned and saw a man striding confidently towards them from the direction of the mound, where he saw a small cave. The man was large, wide shouldered and thick of limb, with a stout and solid stance. He was roughly of a height with Isaand. His skin seemed the same color as the other lake-dwellers, as far as Isaand could see in the dark, but his hair was lighter and wavy like that of a northerner. He wore clothes like Isaand had seen in the lake town Merasca: leather sandals, long loose cotton trousers, and a light vest over his bare chest, which was covered in light hair as well. A thickly woven sash belted his waist, twisted over itself, of some fine fabric and richly patterned. His expression was satisfied, eyes small and half-closed. Taking a hand from behind his back, he held it out to Isaand, a big, heavy knuckled hand covered in light hairs.

“Welcome to my little temple, Brother. I am Hahmn, Lector and cleric of the Unbound Goddess Awlta. I have been looking forward to meeting you.”