The acolytes moved to surround him, letting him walk beside the Sister. No one followed them as they left the square. Nijiri glanced back and caught a glimpse of annoyance warring with awe on the Guardsman’s face; the awe won out and the man flashed a rueful but good-natured smile at Nijiri before turning away. Then the Sisters turned down a different street, heading into the crafter’s district. The shops and smithies here had already closed for the day; most crafters worked at night. Only a few people were still about. Some of these glanced at Nijiri and the Sisters, then quickly looked away; most did not even look. They might envy him for being chosen as a dreamseed tithebearer, but no one would show that envy openly. To do so invited Hananja’s displeasure—and the Sisters’.
“Unwise, Gatherer-Apprentice,” said the Sister. Her voice was low and did not carry. She walked at a stately pace, the bells lining the fringe of her robes and veil tinkling in time. “A man intent on pleasure rarely offers much in the way of information, before or after.”
Nijiri felt his cheeks heat. “Sister Meliatua?”
He could not see her face clearly, but he thought she smiled. “You remember.”
He could hardly have forgotten. “It was the only way, Sister. I—” He hesitated then, unsure of how much to tell her.
She did not look at him as they walked. “Ehiru is no longer in custody. He was released just after sun-zenith, whereafter he left the city through the south gate. He had a token of hers, so a guard there told him how to find the Kisuati ambassador. I do not know why he was released.”
So stunned was Nijiri that it took him several breaths to find his tongue. “You… how did you…”
Another possible smile. “I listened, Gatherer-Apprentice, just as I taught you to listen on Hamyan. We of the Sisterhood have contacts both in and beyond Gujaareh who are willing to provide us with useful information.”
Nijiri frowned, making a guess. “Kisuati contacts?”
“And Soreni, and Jellevy, and many others, including some of your brethren. Rabbaneh asked me to assist you. He said you might be in the vicinity of the guard-stations.”
So it was more than luck that she had come along when she did. “Then do you know where I can find my mentor, Sister?”
“No, but the guard at the south gate might, if you can convince him to tell you. You should move quickly, though. I imagine Ehiru will get information from the Kisuati woman and then kill her. After that, who can say where he will go?”
Nijiri frowned. “Gatherers do not ‘kill,’ Sister.”
She smiled again. “I do not actually share my body with tithebearers, Apprentice. I merely give them dreams. Yet when they wake they are spent and sated, their bodies quivering with remembered ecstasy. Do you think the distinction matters to them much, if at all?”
Nijiri flushed. “I suppose not.”
“You must learn to see things from many angles, Nijiri. If anything, that has always been your mentor’s one failing. He sees only Hananja’s Law.” She sighed; bells sang around her veil. “That narrowness of purpose makes him the greatest of your brethren, but it also leaves him ill equipped to handle the schemes of the corrupt.”
Nijiri tried not to think of the look of utter loss that had been on Ehiru’s face when the Sunset Guardsmen took him away. “Then it’s my task to bear that burden for him, Sister.”
She glanced at him, then away. “I see. You know something of corruption yourself. But you’re so young…” It was a question.
He hesitated, but there was something about her that encouraged candor. “I was servant-caste before the Hetawa adopted me. My mother taught me how to satisfy an adult’s lust almost before I learned to walk. It’s something most servant-caste parents teach their children—something they hope the child will never need, but which could spell survival if the time ever comes.” He shrugged, then sobered further. “But I had no trouble as a servant. Only as an acolyte, in the Hetawa.”
She said nothing, though Nijiri paused, fearing her censure. Her silence helped; after a moment he was able to relax and continue.
“All acolytes go on the list,” he explained. “To serve as pranje attendants, I mean, whenever a Gatherer or Sharer goes through the ritual. It’s supposed to be impossible to escape this duty—but there are ways. And which list one ends up on is often a matter of earning the favor of the Teacher who controls that list.”
“You wanted to be on Ehiru’s list?”
Nijiri’s step faltered for a moment. Flustered, he fell silent; Meliatua sighed and touched his hand in reassurance.
“I had a mentor, too,” she said, softly. “If we had such rituals, I would’ve wanted to serve her, and no one else. No matter how wrong or selfish that might have been considered by my peers.”
Slowly Nijiri nodded. “Yes. It was like that.”
“You love him. Ehiru.”
Nijiri stopped in his tracks, his blood running cold, and Meliatua stopped too. Before he could stammer some excuse, however, she stepped close, like a lover, resting her palms on his chest. “I was servant-caste, too,” she said gently. “I remember the same lessons as you—but I remember, too, that some of those lessons were wrong, Gatherer-Apprentice. They were all about protecting yourself, making yourself strong enough to survive a servant’s life. There were no lessons about how to love safely, or what to do if you did not.”
Nijiri stared at her, forgetting for the moment that they stood in the middle of an open street, surrounded by her attendants and gods knew who else. He remembered his initial thought that she had, somehow, read his mind, on Hamyan Night—but no. Perhaps it was simply the fact that she understood him.
“I…” He faltered, licked his lips. “I don’t know what to do.”
She shrugged. “You’ve done what you can—put yourself close to him, aided him, let him aid you. In the end, that’s all any of us can do for the ones we love. And he needs you, Nijiri. More than he realizes. Perhaps even more than you do.”
Her hands stroked his chest; inadvertently he put his hands on her waist, since that seemed the only proper way to respond to her touch. “You know, though: being a Gatherer is everything to him. Can you love him, knowing that you’ll always be second in his heart?”
“I have always known that.” Nijiri closed his eyes, remembering nights he’d lain awake, wanting. Knowing he could never have what he wanted. “I’ll take what he can give me, and be satisfied with that. It’s just that…”
A Gatherer belonged wholly to Hananja, the Teachers said. It was true for all four of the paths of Hananja’s service—but the Gatherers were special even among those. No one cared if Teachers or Sharers slipped into each others’ rooms at night, so long as they were discreet about it. Even Sentinels took watchbrothers, and fought harder for them than any others. But among the Gatherers, it was different. Respect, admiration, brotherly love—those were right, acceptable, even encouraged. Only selfish, singular desire was forbidden.
“It’s very hard, Sister,” he whispered, unable to meet her eyes. “I became a Gatherer because I wanted to be strong. Because then I would not need others, and grief would no longer have the power to hurt me. I wanted to be with Ehiru; I wanted to be Ehiru. And now…”
She smiled through her veil—and then very, very gently, pushed him away.
“Now, you’re not a child anymore,” she said. “Now you see: Gatherers are only as strong as other men. Now you know you cannot be Ehiru… but you can be worthy of him. And now you know: there’s no shame in love.”
He could not help a small, bitter smile. “No. But there’s more pain than I expected. And it takes more strength than I realized it would, to endure.”
She watched him a bit longer before inclining her veiled head. “Forgive me for disrupting your peace, then, Gatherer-Apprentice.” She resumed walking and after a moment he forced his legs to move again. His heart took longer to settle, but she remained quiet as they walked, and gradually, it steadied.
“There’s a taxmaster in the U
nbelievers’ District who is known to me,” Meliatua said at length. “His booth is just beyond the gate, on the third corner; ask for a half-Jellevite named Caiyera. Tell him you’re my friend, and he’ll tell you the Kisuati woman’s location. But do this soon; his shift ends not long after sunset.”
Nijiri glanced up at the already-reddening sky. “Yes, Sister.”
They had reached another intersection. The street-market here was brisk with people and business; many shoppers came out only once the day’s worst heat had faded. Across the square was a broad street marked by an arch, and some ways beyond that Nijiri could see the south gate, which led to the Unbelievers’ District.
“Don’t linger after dark, Gatherer-Apprentice,” Meliatua said, and he looked at her in surprise. “The beast that stalks the nighttime streets has tasted your soul once already and may crave more. You don’t yet have the skill to fight it.”
Unease warred with pride; Nijiri squared his shoulders. “I was caught by surprise, Sister.”
She smiled again, but something about that smile let him know he was not being mocked. “Of course.” She stepped close again, lifted a hand, and touched his cheek to the tinkle of bells. “Go with Hananja’s blessing, Nijiri, and remember that there is no corruption in love, either.”
She turned away, her acolytes following, and it was only after she’d left him that he comprehended her words. They made him feel—not better. But more sure of himself.
With his sense of purpose renewed, he started toward the gate to go and find Ehiru.
17
The Gatherer had meditated, he had prayed, but it was not enough. It was never enough. In the end, when the mind forgot prayers and lost the ability to meditate, all that remained was the terrible, ceaseless gibber of raw need. Only one thing could silence that need. In the morning they would come, in the morning they would come; this became his reason for existence. Until then, nothing to do but endure. Distract himself. A boy lay pinned beneath him with eyes shut. An offering. The Gatherer lifted his free hand to stroke one of the boy’s cheeks, marveling at the beauty and innocence of youth. He could devour that beauty, paint himself with that innocence. Would that erase the sins of his life? Perhaps he could find out.
He felt no rage when he first drove his fist into the boy’s belly. It had been a way to distract himself, nothing more. But as the boy’s eyes opened wide, filling with shock and agony and the horrible sick awareness of what death might feel like when it came, something replaced the drumming, churning need: relief. The boy had never experienced such pain before. He was terrified. And at the sight of another’s fear and agony, the Gatherer’s own diminished. Just a little, but even that helped.
Oh, yes. And such lovely eyes the boy had. Like desert jasper.
So he lifted his fist and brought it down again, and again, soon finding himself delighted by the boy’s cringing, his whimpers, his hoarse garbled pleas. Eventually there was blood too, and that gave him the greatest pleasure of all.
* * *
Ehiru came awake with a gasp, his heart pounding in the cool darkness of Etissero’s house.
It could not have been a dream. He had hardly enough dreamblood to sustain his life at the moment, and even if he’d had more, it could not have been a dream. He had not dreamed in twenty years.
A vision, then—but a horrible, sickening one. Ehiru sat up, putting his forehead in his hands to dull the ache that was caused by exhaustion, sleeping outside of his normal pattern, and his soul’s growing need. He could barely think around that ache, but he knew his basic narcomancy well enough. Most visions were born from memories. Nijiri had never served him in the pranje, and therefore Ehiru had never beaten Nijiri. He couldn’t have. To deliberately inflict such pain on another was not just corrupt, it was alien to his very being.
Unless his memories were not so clear as he believed. Or unless the images plaguing his rest had been not a vision of the past, but a true-seeing of the future.
He moaned, too empty of peace even to pray.
“Ehiru-brother.”
His hands formed fists and his body swung upright, coiling itself to attack. But the figure that sat on the couch opposite Ehiru in the breezeway did not move, waiting for him to calm. That consideration cleared the sluggishness from his mind so that he could think at last. Nijiri.
Ehiru’s belly clenched. Did I ever hurt you? he wanted to ask, but he could not muster the courage to face the answer.
Nijiri’s dim form stirred and came over, crouching beside his couch in a pool of Waking Moon’s light. Ehiru’s fear eased at the naked concern on the boy’s face. Could someone he had used so cruelly still love him? Surely that was his proof.
“You’re not well, Brother,” Nijiri said. He spoke in the softest of whispers, as on a Gathering. “You need an infusion.”
“I need peace,” Ehiru replied, and winced as his voice cut the silence, hoarse and louder than usual. “But She denies me that even in sleep.”
Nijiri took Ehiru’s hand, fumbled with it, and lifted it to his face. He held the fore and middle fingers apart, trying to lay them on his own closed eyelids. An offering—
“No!” He jerked away; Nijiri frowned. “My control is weakening, Nijiri. I might not stop with just a little.”
“Then take it all, Brother.” Nijiri gazed up at him steadily. So trusting! “You know I’m not afraid.”
The words teased forth a memory of their first meeting: the bringer of death and the child who welcomed it. That memory had always brought Ehiru peace and it did not fail to do so now, pushing back the confusion and misery that the false-seeing had caused. He exhaled. “Hananja hasn’t chosen you yet, and I will not risk your death. I can hold for a few days more. There will be others who need Gathering. There always are.”
The boy scowled. “I don’t like that plan, Ehiru-brother.”
“Nor do I. But the only alternative is to return to the Hetawa, which we cannot do yet.” He paused as the implication of the boy’s presence finally sank in. “You should be there, though. Why aren’t you?”
“Sonta-i-brother and Rabbaneh-brother sent me to help you escape the Sunset Guard.”
“What?”
Nijiri squeezed his hand to silence him; Ehiru had been too shocked to keep his voice down.
“The Reaper is an abomination against the Goddess,” the boy whispered. “The Superior and the Prince have not done their duty in destroying it, therefore we—you and I—must hunt the creature down.” He hesitated, then added, “Doing so will also prove your purity, Brother. We’ll be able to return to the Hetawa then.”
Blessed Hananja, was I such a fool at sixteen? If so, thank you for letting me see forty. “Rabbaneh and Sonta-i should have known better than this. Even if we destroy the Reaper, we can no longer trust the Hetawa. Someone there created that monster.”
“And once we return to the Hetawa we will find that person, or persons,” Nijiri said, doggedly. “Easier from within the Hetawa than without. We can seek aid from the Council of Paths—”
“Whose members may themselves be involved in this nightmare—”
“Then we’ll purge them, too!” Startled, Ehiru looked at Nijiri and saw that his expression had gone fierce and cold. It was a fleeting glimpse of the Gatherer that Nijiri would one day become, and in spite of everything Ehiru felt his heart swell with pride.
“Sonta-i-brother reminded me of our path’s role,” the boy continued. “Must I remind you? If the Hetawa has become corrupt then it is our duty to purify it, under Hananja’s Law. It is that simple, Brother.”
That simple.
Ehiru sat back against the wall, feeling his world invert once more. Could it really be? He took back his earlier prayer, instead thanking Hananja for once more granting him the clear vision of sixteen, if indirectly through Nijiri’s eyes. Two days’ worth of unhappiness and confusion faded from his heart, and for the first time in what felt like ages, he smiled.
“Sometimes it’s wise for the mentor to
listen to his apprentice rather than the other way around.” Ehiru squeezed Nijiri’s hand, then waved toward the other couch in the breezeway. “Rest. In the morning we leave with the Kisuati woman. We’re going to Kisua.”
“Kisua? But the Reaper is here.”
It was, but the answers that Ehiru needed—the who and the how and the why of it—were not. Killing the creature would not eliminate the corruption underlying the whole affair; he could trust no one in Gujaareh. But the woman Sunandi sought the same truth as he, and in her homeland she had the resources to perhaps uncover it. Corrupt or no, she would be useful to his cause.
“We’ll return here afterward,” he told Nijiri, “but first we resolve the matter of the woman’s abeyance. If what she says is true, then the Reaper may be only a symptom of much greater sickness.”
“In what way?”
Ehiru sighed as some of his peace faded. He had known it could only be fleeting. “A purge may be needed throughout all Gujaareh.”
By the time we finish, the Hetawa’s stores of dreamblood will overflow.
SECOND INTERLUDE
This truth Gujaareh has never liked to acknowledge: our Hananja is not the greatest of the Dreaming Moon’s children. She is not artful like Dane-inge, who dances rainbows across the sky to mark the end of floodseason. Nor is She industrious like Merik, who grinds down the mountains and fills up the valleys left by his father’s rutting. Yet it was given to Hananja to see to Her family’s health and happiness—an important task in any lineage, to be sure, but even more so among immortals. Thus did She create the place we call Ina-Karekh, where Her fellow gods might entertain themselves with every wonder in imagination. But because there was nowhere to put this place—for Ina-Karekh is vaster than both the heavens and earth—She kept it within herself. She taught Her brothers and sisters to separate out their innermost selves and send only that to Ina-Karekh, leaving the rest behind. And because the gods found our kind entertaining, She shared this gift with mortals too.