Starman

  StarDrifter blinked and saw the Nine still there, their hands upraised, the light shining in their hair.

  He blinked again and they were gone, and Axis and Azhure were at his side.

  “I did not know,” he said, “but, knowing you, I understand.”

  They sat on the rock ledge of the mountain, a cliff at their feet, the glacier and Icebear Coast before them. On one of the distant ice floes an icebear gambolled; it was missing one ear.

  “Do you remember what I asked you when last we sat here?” Azhure said.

  The wind caught at her unfettered hair, and Axis smoothed it away from her face. “Yes. Yes, I do. You asked if it bothered me that I would live so long.”

  “And you said that it did, that it bothered you that you might sit here in five hundred years and not be able to recall the name of the lovely young woman who sat at your side and whose bones now crumbled into dust.”

  They were both quiet, and Axis turned his eyes back to the view before them.

  “And now…” He entwined his fingers with hers.

  “Now we face a longer and stranger future, but we will face it together.”

  He grinned, and with his free hand he caught at something floating in the air. It was a Moonwildflower, and he tangled it within her hair. “I promise I will come home to you, Azhure.”

  Her fingers tightened briefly, painfully, about his. “Come home,” she said. “Come home.”

  He kissed her and changed the subject. “When will you leave?”

  “This afternoon, Axis. I will take Caelum and the Alaunt and the horses and traverse the alpine passes to the Icescarp Barren. From there we will ride for Sigholt.”

  “Ride with the Moon, Azhure.”

  She nodded, and smiled. “And you?”

  He laughed. “Me and Arne? Arne has developed no more respect for me since he has heard some of the whispers about us that are being bruited about the mountain. He grimly tells me that he will attend me for as long as I need him, and so he says and so it will be. There are only a few days before Fire-Night, so I will try to shake friend Arne slightly by taking him to travel the waterways with Orr.”

  She cuddled closer to Axis. “Perhaps Arne can discuss the mysteries of the Stars with Orr. When will you leave?”

  “When we leave this ledge. There is no reason to wait.”

  Azhure’s eyes filled with tears. “Come home to me, Axis.”

  His hand tightened about hers. “Will you get to Rivkah in time?”

  “I think so, although she will be cross that I have tarried so long. Axis?”

  “Hmmm?”

  “What do you want me to do at the birth?”

  Axis was horrified. He knew what she referred to; Rivkah had asked Azhure to midwife the birth—and a talented midwife could make any infanticide look so much like a stillbirth even the mother would not be aware of what had happened.

  “Oh, Azhure! Rivkah trusts you. Would you break her trust for me? No!” He looked away. “Do not answer that, Azhure.”

  He took a deep breath, and turned back to her. “She trusts you, Azhure. I do not want you to break that trust for my sake.”

  They sat in silence for some time, then Azhure lifted her fingers to his face. “Come home to me, Axis.”

  He pulled her back against his body and hid her face in his shoulder.

  “Come home to me.”

  And the seagulls wheeling far below them took up the cry and spread it up and down the Icebear Coast.

  Come home to me! Come home to me!

  66

  THE TEST

  “We must consider,” Barsarbe said, her eyes sharp, her voice soft, “what to do.”

  The Avar had assembled in the Earth Tree Grove for Fire-Night. This festival was of only minor importance for the Avar, and usually they would celebrate it in their own Clan groups wherever they happened to be in the Avarinheim. But this Fire-Night would be special. This Fire-Night would see the crafting of the Rainbow Sceptre. And so the Avar had gathered in the Earth Tree Grove.

  “This will be our last chance to plot our own future,” Barsarbe continued, walking slowly around the outside of the great circle of stone that guarded the Earth Tree. “Tomorrow night is Fire-Night. Tomorrow night the StarMan will appear and ask for our assistance. Tonight we must decide whether or not to give it to him.”

  A confused murmuring rose from among the Avar. Many of the Banes, who sat in the front ranks, stared at Barsarbe unbelievingly. But it was Grindle, leader of the GhostTree Clan, who spoke out.

  He stood respectfully. “Bane Barsarbe. I thought there was no question of aiding the StarMan. Surely we wait only for Tree Friend? When she joins us…” He hesitated. None of the Avar had seen Faraday Tree Friend since she disappeared the evening the Avarinheim was joined to Minstrelsea. The Avar realised Faraday was in the Sacred Grove, but when would she join them? When would she lead them into their new home?

  Grindle abruptly realised that Barsarbe and the entire Avar people were staring at him, waiting for him to continue. “When Faraday joins us she will present the StarMan to us and we will follow her lead. We must unite with the StarMan, as the Icarii have, in order to defeat Gorgrael. This much is clear from the Prophecy of the Destroyer.”

  “Thank you, Grindle,” Barsarbe said. She touched his shoulder, and he sat back down.

  Around him the Avar still looked puzzled.

  “My people.” Barsarbe resumed her pacing. “I am senior Bane among you. Mine is the responsibility for ensuring the Avar step onto the right paths, chose the right fork. No-one can deny that tomorrow night we will face a fork in the path. But which is the right direction? Which the road to surety?”

  “With the StarMan, surely,” someone said, and Barsarbe could see several heads nod.

  “My people. I have thought long and hard about our future, and while I travelled with Faraday Tree Friend, I learned of events that disturbed me. They made me see our future path differently. Now is the time that I must share my thoughts with you.”

  She walked several paces with her head bowed. When she spoke again, her voice was stronger, and harsher. “Avar! Do you know that the StarMan has betrayed Faraday Tree Friend?

  “He pretended to love her, but did he not leave her in Gorkenfort to survive or not while he escaped? And now…now I have learned that he treacherously betrayed Faraday for another. Azhure. You must remember her.”

  Again Grindle rose to his feet, more cautiously this time. “It was Beltide, Barsarbe. Bonds and promises are set aside on Beltide.”

  “Worse than Beltide,” Barsarbe hissed, spinning on her heel to face him. “Far worse! The StarMan has married this woman Azhure and cast Faraday out of his house.” Grindle sank down, his eyes on the ground. “Faraday should have married the StarMan. Faraday should have given him his heir!”

  She ran her eyes ran over the assembled Avar. None of them moved. “And we can all remember what kind of woman this Azhure was. Violent. Is that not why we refused her acceptance into the Avar? Violence trails after her.”

  Grindle made as if to stand up again, but Barsarbe stopped him with an angry glance. “Now she has embraced violence fully. Now she walks with bow and arrows, and hounds clamour at her heels. She is a huntress! You did not see what she did to her home village, my people. She destroyed it, burned all who lived within it…and smiled as she did it.”

  Shra, seated besides her father, narrowed her eyes, but for the moment she held her peace.

  “You said there was a fork in our path, Bane Barsarbe,” said Brode of the SilentWalk Clan. As one of the senior Avar, his word would weigh heavily in whatever decision the Avar made.

  “Yes, Brode. We have passively accepted whatever the Prophecy told us. The Prophecy says that we must unite with the Plough and the Wing in order to defeat Gorgrael.”

  She took a deep breath. “But what if we have a different choice? My people, is this our fight? We have the Avarinheim, and now we have Minstrelsea to the south. The Earth
Tree sings, and the forests sing with her. We are safe. Gorgrael cannot touch us!”

  Barsarbe spread her arms wide, hands and voice entreating. “Don’t we have what we wanted? So why help Axis? It will surely only bring further pain to our people, and Mother knows we have endured enough. We have what we want,” she repeated slowly, lowering her hands. “I say we have the choice of refusing the StarMan.”

  Apart from the Song of the Earth Tree, which the Avar had grown so used to they hardly noticed it any more, the grove was completely silent. Here and there heads nodded as the Avar considered Barsarbe’s arguments.

  But Shra had heard enough. Now, as the Mother had told her, was the time to speak.

  “You use poisonous words, Barsarbe,” she said, and stood up. Shra was small and fragile, even for an Avar child, but her eyes shone with a knowledge that the Avar respected, and her demeanour was far older than her years. “Your mind has been so addled by your spite and jealousy that you can no longer distinguish bright glade from shadowed night.”

  “Shra.” Brode walked forward, and stood by Barsarbe’s side. “I think we should listen to Barsarbe. She is, after all, senior among the Banes, and you…you are but a five-year-old girl-child.”

  Shra stepped out of the crowd so that all could see her.

  “I am but a five-year-old girl-child,” she said, “but I have been presented to the Horned Ones and I am training to be a Bane. And even the little I have seen of the events in the world beyond the Avarinheim has been more than anyone else here, even Barsarbe. I…I am appalled,” and she stamped her tiny foot, “at Barsarbe’s misrepresentation of the true nature of the events and people that surround us. If it takes the mouth of a five-year-old girl-child to speak the words of truth, then so be it.”

  To the watching Avar she no longer seemed such a child. She radiated such assurance, and such righteous anger, that even Brode retreated a step as Shra walked to where he stood with Barsarbe.

  Had her recreation when so close to death wrought this change in her?

  Barsarbe stared at the child with dark, cold eyes.

  Shra ignored her. “As the Earth Tree is my witness,” she said, her voice sweet and clear, “I am sick of the Avar reluctance to act, and I am shamed by it! Are you proud that such as Axis and Azhure fight for our cause? Are you proud that the Icarii have spilt so much of their own blood on our behalf as well as theirs?”

  “We are a pacific people,” Barsarbe said.

  “We are fools!” Now Shra was truly angry, and it was not only at Barsarbe that she directed her anger. “We cling tenaciously to our creed of non-violence, yet we are ready enough to project violence when it suits us. Barsarbe condemns Azhure for the violence that trails her, but did none of you feel the violence that the trees themselves projected so very recently? Did none of you hear the death that the forests sang…led by the Earth Tree who now stands so ‘peaceful’ behind me?”

  “They slaughtered our enemies!” Barsarbe spat.

  “So does Azhure!” Shra cried. “How could you stand there and pretend distaste for her actions in Smyrton? She saved your life as she saved mine and Faraday’s! Avar, listen to me! Azhure slew Artor the Ploughman for our sakes, and protected Faraday. If there are forests below the Avarinheim now, then it is largely due to Azhure’s help. Have you forgotten the Yuletide slaughter already? Have you forgotten who did so much to save us then?”

  “We are safe in our forests, Shra,” Barsarbe said, battling to control her temper. All could be lost if she slapped the child as she so richly deserved.

  “Our forests, Barsarbe?” Shra whispered, tears gathering in her eyes. “We do not own these forests, they merely tolerate our presence. If the Avarinheim and the Minstrelsea allow other feet to walk their paths, then who are we to demur?”

  “Allow the Plains Dwellers to share our forests, Shra?” Barsarbe grabbed the child’s arm, giving her a rough shake. “I have listened enough!”

  Grindle sprang to his feet. “Barsarbe, let my daughter go! I have heard her speak, and she has shamed me, if not you! Gorgrael is of our blood, and his destruction is our responsibility as well as that of the people of the Plough and the Wing.” He put his hands on his daughter’s shoulders and attempted to pull her away from the Bane’s grip.

  But Barsarbe was not prepared to let go. Her fingers sank into the flesh of Shra’s upper arm and the girl cried out.

  “For the Mother’s sake—” Grindle began, but Barsarbe shouted him down, her delicate face contorted with hate.

  “She has been left to run too wild and free, Grindle! I shall have to walk with your Clan awhile to make sure that she receives the chastisement she so obviously needs.”

  Grindle let his daughter go and reached for Barsarbe instead. Appalled by both Grindle’s actions and Barsarbe’s treatment of Shra, Brode stepped between them and hauled the man away. Barsarbe still gripped Shra’s arm painfully, and her mouth twisted with satisfaction as Brode pushed Grindle back several more paces.

  “The Avar are in a pitiful state,” she said, turning towards those who sat still and horrified by the scene before them. “We have been contaminated by the violence that Azhure has brought into this forest. It is not surprising that the two who have had so much to do with Azhure—Grindle and Shra—should now so champion her cause.”

  “This is all it is about, Barsarbe,” Shra said, blinking back tears of pain, “Azhure. You hate her so much that you are prepared to lead our people into despair to sate your hate.”

  “I am prepared to preserve our people!” Barsarbe cried. “My people, can you not see that I am right? Can you not see that the best hope for us rests in turning our backs to the pain beyond the forests? We are safe here. Gorgrael cannot touch us here. Let’s leave it at that. We do have the right to refuse the StarMan when he asks for our help.”

  To many of the Avar her words made sense. The world beyond the forest was too frightening to risk. Others were more hesitant.

  “It was one of our women who birthed Gorgrael,” Grindle shouted. “Don’t any of you feel responsibility for that? Shouldn’t we help right the wrong we have bred?”

  Barsarbe ignored him, scanning the crowd with anxious eyes. Whose words would they support?

  “If we do not agree to help Axis then he cannot defeat Gorgrael,” Shra said, her soft words reaching every ear in the grove. “And if Axis dies then the world will crumble about us. Even the forest will eventually wilt under Gorgrael’s relentless onslaught.”

  “She lies!” Barsarbe shouted. “We will always be safe within the forests!”

  “For this generation, and perhaps the next,” Shra replied, “but what when Gorgrael’s power has grown even stronger than it is now? Should we condemn our descendants to lingering death because we did not have the honour or the stomach to act?”

  “Let the trees decide,” Barsarbe called with deadly calm. “Let the trees decide the truth.”

  I have won, she thought exultantly. I have won! The trees will never decide for Axis or Azhure. She let Shra go.

  “You would put yourselves to a Test of Truth?” one of the other Banes asked.

  “Yes,” Barsarbe said. “A Test. Do you agree?”

  All Avar children who showed the potential to become Banes were administered a frightening test when they were only toddlers, so frightening that many children did not survive it. Despite this, the Avar continued to administer it, because only through this test could they determine which children had the potential to become truly powerful Banes.

  But what Barsarbe was suggesting was far worse. The Test of Truth had rarely been administered in Avar history, and certainly not within the past three or four hundred years.

  “We are faced with the fork in the path,” Barsarbe said. “Let the Test provide the answer for you.”

  “No!” Grindle cried and reached for his daughter. This time Brode let him go.

  “No,” he repeated, now down on his knees with his arms about Shra. “There is no need, Barsar
be.”

  “There is every need,” she said. “I am certain of the truth, of the path we should take. But I can see that some among you yet demur. This decision is too important to be taken without unanimity. A Test will convince doubters.”

  “And will kill one of you,” Grindle said, his arms tightening around Shra. He had already lost her mother in this grove; he did not want to risk Shra as well.

  “Do you fear for your daughter’s life?” Barsarbe asked scathingly.

  “I am willing,” Shra said.

  “I agree,” said a male Bane after a pause, and the one next to him nodded. “So do I.”

  “And I.”

  “I will agree.”

  And, at first hesitantly, then with greater certainty, the Avar agreed to the Test.

  As the last of the voices subsided Barsarbe turned and smiled coldly at Shra. “Let us begin.”

  They were taken to the Earth Tree, where each stepped out of her robe and, naked, was bound to the tree by ropes. Then, surrounded by the power of the Earth Tree and the Banes before them, they were thrust into the Test.

  The forest was calm and quiet, not like it was in the test both had taken as two year olds. Then the trees had crowded them, hindering their efforts to escape the horror that chased them through the forest.

  Now the air lay still and heavy with moisture, as if before a storm. Leaves hung listlessly, and every footfall was an affront to the lassitude that gripped the forest.

  They walked separately, about forty paces apart. Occasionally one would glance at the other, then her eyes would slide away again. Each wished she were clothed; not through any sense of shame, but because a robe would give her the means to wipe hands moist with apprehension and the warm, damp air.

  Neither spoke.

  Neither knew how long or how far they walked, but at the same instant both became aware that mist drifted through the trees; each took a last glance at the other, knowing they would never see each other again. Each wondered at her wisdom in suggesting or agreeing to the Test.