As far as Damisa could tell—although all the hunting and foraging severely limited the time available for theological analysis—the spirits of this land were much more approachable than the gods of Atlantis, who were in essence nonhuman forces who dwelt beyond the mortal sphere. For all their legendary quirks and feuds, Manoah or Ni-Terat seemed less like individuals than signifiers, representatives of the immeasurable powers that moved the sun and the stars.
Although sailors prayed to the Star Shaper because he was the Lord of the Sea, and children prayed to the Great Maker because it helped them to sleep at night, not even Ni-Terat, the Dark Mother of All, had interceded to save a single human life. Only Caratra, the Nurturer, the Child Who Becomes the Mother, was traditionally believed to demonstrate a genuine interest in ordinary people, and that was only a few times a year.
In contrast, the Lake folk honored the simple spirits of field and forest. But they did not treat them as great gods; they were not magnificent beings who might eventually grant a favor, but . . . The Lake gods seem more like good neighbors, Damisa decided, inclined to be helpful whether they notice you or not . . .
She shivered a little as she approached the tree, wondering as always if what she felt at such rustic shrines was an illusion somehow created by the beliefs of the marsh folk or something more genuine—the actual presence of a real spirit.
“Shining One, accept my offering,” she muttered as she tucked a spray of white hawthorn blooms into the straw. “Help us find food for our people.” She stood back to let Selast kneel and add some primroses. As they gazed up into the branches where the new leaves filtered the sunlight to lucent pale green, all the air seemed to shimmer and dance.
For a moment, then, Damisa seemed to feel the touch of a presence on her soul—curious, a little amused, but not unfriendly. Instinctively she sank to her knees, resting her hands upon the damp soil. Someone was listening, and that was more than she had ever felt in any of the splendid temples of Alkona or Ahtarra.
“Bright One! Help me! I am so hungry here!” her heart cried, and in that moment she realized that her emptiness was not that of the body, but of the soul.
Selast had already gone after the Lake women. Damisa got to her feet, glad that the other girl had not seen her moment of weakness. Her business just now was to find food for their bodies, and until they did her spirit would just have to fend for itself.
In the first year, the refugees had cleared ground near the springs and planted the seeds they had brought with them, but perhaps they had not done so at the right time, for their first harvest had failed entirely. Without the nut flour the saji women made, the preserves of fruits, the good fortune of the sailors in their incessant hunting, and the hearty cooperation of one and all, the refugees might have fought a hunger more gnawing than they had ever known.
They did better in some ways the following year, but the amount of food ripe enough to be harvested had been small indeed. If Elis had not had a real talent for growing things, their survival would have been even more doubtful. Although she could hardly “make a rock bear fruit,” as Liala often said, nevertheless, every seed Elis had personally planted took root and lived. She had even been able to persuade the battered feather tree that had once belonged to Lord Micail to thrive.
According to the marsh folk, there were tribes farther inland who sowed grain and kept cattle. The marsh folk lived by the fruits of the earth because the land was unsuitable for farming. Yet the natives had never hesitated to share what they had, and were always willing to take the Atlanteans with them to hunt or forage for edible plants and waterfowl, fish and shellfish, and a wealth of other resources for those who knew where to find them. That was, after all, why Heron’s tribe came here.
But life by the lake is not so bountiful when the warm season ends! They probably think we’re all idiots because we stay. Damisa laughed, then quickened her pace to catch up with the others. She grimaced, envying the efficient way Selast had of loping along. Perhaps she could catch up if she took a shortcut across the meadow . . . but the ground beneath the soft grass was part bog. With the next step, her foot went through the soft surface and with a cry she went down. She had just managed to get free, leg muddy to the knee, when Selast ran back to her.
“Don’t try to sit up!” the younger girl snapped. “Where does it hurt? Let me see!” Her clever fingers probed Damisa’s ankle and then her knee.
“I’m fine, really, just muddy,” Damisa insisted, though in truth, it was rather pleasant to feel those warm fingers on her skin. She plucked a handful of grass and tried to wipe her leg clean.
With a sigh of relief, Selast sat down beside her.
“Thank you!” Sudden warmth filled Damisa and she reached out to give the other girl a hug of gratitude. Selast was all muscle and bone; it was like holding some supple wild thing. For a moment everything was very still, but then Selast hugged back, hard, but not roughly . . .
“We had better rest until we can be sure that foot will bear you,” Selast said a few moments later. But Damisa, astonished by how pleasant it felt to hold the other girl in her arms, did not let go.
“Do you remember the shop in Ahtarra,” she asked wistfully, “just by the pylon, where they sold those delicious little cakes dribbled with honey?” She eased back upon the soft grass and Selast went with her, nestling into the curve of her arm.
“Oh yes,” Selast was saying, with her eyes half closed. “I’d die for just one! This year the stupid emmer and barley seeds had better figure out how to grow! Nuts make good flour in a pinch I guess, but—it’s not the same.”
Damisa sighed, half consciously stroking Selast’s strong shoulders. “When I was a little girl in Alkona, they would bring in cartloads of grapes and ila berries from the vineyards in the hills at summer’s end, so many they didn’t even care if they spilled over the wagon-sides. And more and more of them fell off, getting crushed on the cobbles, until the gutters looked as if they were running with wine.”
“Never be able to grow good grapes here. Not enough sun . . .” But there was light enough to turn Selast’s skin to gold, glowing warm against the wind-ruffled meadow grass.
Damisa pushed herself up on one arm and looked down at her. “Your lips are just the color of those grapes,” she whispered.
Selast stared up at her, her face filled with light. “Taste them,” she dared, and smiled.
By the time they caught up with the others, it was past midday. The marsh women clustered, softly gossiping as they poked into the dense reeds around the lakeside. Hearing Damisa and Selast approach, one of the women gabbled excitedly and pointed; then, as the two girls clearly did not understand, the woman flapped her hands, and cupped them, as if she were cradling something between her palms.
“Eggs?” asked Damisa. After two years, all of the acolytes had made some progress in learning the Lake folk tongue, but Iriel and Kalaran were the only ones who could actually speak it. Damisa herself had not yet progressed beyond a limited vocabulary. The small woman grinned and simply crooked her hand in a summoning gesture.
As she followed, Damisa took the precaution of kirtling up her skirts, and she was glad she had: their destination was the nest of some strange duck, which had evidently thought itself well hidden among the reeds.
It would have been hard to say who was less happy with the encounter, the duck or the acolyte, as it degenerated into a furious mix of swearwords and squawking. She left each mother duck at least one egg to hatch, but that didn’t seem to soothe them. Damisa would not have thought a duck could bite, but she had nicks and scratches on both hands before they moved off toward higher ground to search for spring greens.
The tender new leaves of chickweed and goosefoot and mustard could be eaten raw, and there were lilies whose bulbs would provide more solid fare. Nettles were edible too, stewed as greens or steeped to make tea, but the native women always laughed when the acolytes tried to harvest them, for there was no way not to get stung, which made the girls cu
rse in a manner most unbecoming to future priestesses.
Selast sucked her sore fingers and sulked, even after they turned toward home. “It could be worse,” Damisa said, taking the other girl’s hand and kissing the reddened stings. “Kalaran had to go out with the hunters. Nettles sting, but you don’t have to chase them. And they don’t sneak up on you. And they don’t have claws and big teeth!”
“I’d rather be hunting,” Selast growled, “except then I’d have to be with Kalaran.”
Damisa sighed, wracked with conflicting emotions. She had long ago come to terms with the fact that what she felt about having lost her own destined husband was mainly relief. But Selast and Kalaran were still officially betrothed and would be expected to marry some day, even though they had about as much interest in one another as a couple of rocks. Why is it, she thought, that however often somebody tells us the rules have changed, that things are different here—she felt her face warm as she remembered the events of the afternoon—why is it we still have to keep doing pretty much whatever we would have done in Atlantis? If they could have kept the splendid ways of old Atlantis she would not have minded, but it was the rules, not the rewards that seemed to have survived.
“But there are so few of us,” she said finally. “Can you honestly say you wouldn’t care if something happened to him?”
“He’s got the luck of a drunk!” Selast scoffed. “He never gets hurt—except for his feelings. Besides, animal attacks have not been our worry.”
Damisa frowned, but she knew what the other girl meant. Early last summer, two sailors had gone missing. The marsh folk sent out trackers, but found no sign of them. The straggling scatter of huts where the sailors who had taken native wives lived with the merchants and others who were not of the priesthood was full of stories. Some thought that the missing seamen had grown tired of waiting for the Crimson Serpent to head out to sea again, and had gone back to the coast, where they had been picked up by a passing ship, but few took the tale seriously. Whether they said so or not, most believed that the sailors had simply fallen into a bog and been sucked down.
There was less ambiguity about Malaera’s death. Morose from the beginning, the elderly Blue Robe priestess had finally succeeded in drowning herself in the lake. Damisa suspected that Liala blamed her personally for allowing the older woman to die. It wasn’t even my turn to sit with her, she told herself, with a pang of guilt, though it was true that she had been the one most often assigned to help.
“That’s cruel,” Damisa said suddenly. “You really wouldn’t miss Kalaran at all, would you!”
“Depends,” said Selast darkly. “Will I get his dinner?”
“You’re terrible,” Damisa said, not even noticing the tear in her own eye. “You wouldn’t even miss me, I guess!”
“What? Oh, don’t be stupid,” Selast began, but before she could say more, they emerged from the woods and found the settlement buzzing like a hive.
“A ship is coming!” Iriel was running toward them. “Reidel and his men sailed out to guide them in!”
“They left hours ago,” Elis added, approaching them. “We shouldn’t have to wait much longer.”
Everyone turned as Tiriki came out of her hut, waving cooing farewells to her baby, although little Domara seemed quite oblivious in the saji woman Metia’s arms. The birth and healthy growth of the child seemed to have made the high priestess into a far more cheerful person, but as Tiriki turned toward them and smiled in greeting, Damisa saw that the old familiar haunted pain had returned to Tiriki’s eyes.
“She’s hoping they bring news of Micail,” said Elis in a low voice.
“After all this time? Not too likely,” Selast scoffed.
“It’s all very well for you to sneer!” Elis snapped. “Your betrothed is still alive and well. And at least I know what happened to Aldel—I can mourn him properly. But not knowing . . .” She shook her head, eyes wet with compassion. “That must be the worst of all.”
Damisa grimaced, but she and her betrothed had only known each other for a year. She could hardly even remember what Kalhan looked like after all this time.
From the lake came the watchman’s high, clear call.
“Finally!” Iriel shouted and started running down the path that led to the river. Laughing, the others followed her.
They arrived just in time to watch the Crimson Serpent dropping anchor alongside another, smaller craft, not a warship but a midsize fishing boat, with only one mast and what looked like a crude shelter inside the ship. Her once-bright blue-and-copper paint had been worn away by wind and wave. Next to Reidel’s wingbird, she looked like a mule beside a racehorse; but mules are sturdy beasts. This craft had not only survived the Sinking but made it here . . . “How many of them, I wonder,” Damisa muttered.
Selast said, “I hope they brought something good to eat.”
“There you go again,” Elis reproved. “Just as likely, they’re hungrier than we are, and we’ll have to cast lots for every bite.”
“Good,” Selast growled. “I’m feeling lucky!”
By now, everyone for acres around must have heard about the arrival. At every moment someone else joined the crowd until the muddy shore was three-deep with marsh folk and Atlanteans, jostling one another and chattering excitedly.
As Reidel’s ship settled into place beside the other craft, some men on the shore swung planed logs to her side, and then two groups of sailors leaped lightly down to finish the job of securing the ships to the tree stump that served as a mooring post. Damisa found herself holding her breath as the huddle of shapes on deck separated enough for them to see the first passenger, a strongly built man with a grizzled black beard. Cautiously, he made his way across the plank, carrying a little girl who looked to be about five years old. As he stepped onto the narrow promenade, the child at last loosened her grip on the man’s neck and shoulders and looked about, allowing Damisa a quick glimpse of her face—well-shaped eyebrows, a noble nose, and a heart-shaped mouth.
The big man turned and watched anxiously as the sailors helped a slender woman step off the plank. She gazed at the watching crowd, and then, weeping gratefully, ran into the bearded man’s embrace.
“A family!” Iriel whispered. “A real family!”
“As opposed to a false one?” Selast scoffed.
But Damisa understood, or thought she did. Married or not, the priesthood did not always choose to live together in family units; among those who had escaped on the Crimson Serpent, there had been no such couples. There were, of course, many families of Lake folk, but these were Atlanteans, and possibly even of the priests’ caste . . . Damisa realized that the stinging in her eyes came from tears. Furtively she dashed them away as Tiriki hurried toward the newcomers, holding out her hands.
Damisa started after her with a spurt of resentment. The high priestess had apparently forgotten how to form a proper escort . . . But would these people even realize that Tiriki was a priestess? Damisa blinked, trying to reconcile her memory of the ethereal figure who had welcomed the Prince of Alkonath to Ahtarra so long ago with this woman whose wispy fair hair was already coming free from a simple braid. Yet if Tiriki’s coarse robe was badly woven, ragged at the hem and stained with mud, still she addressed the strangers with all the gravity and formal poise of a Guardian of Light.
Chedan had by now also joined the escort. Damisa noted with pride that he was at least wearing the golden cord of the Robe of Ceremony, although it was cinctured around a faded tunic . . . Of course, she thought, these new people look pretty shabby too. But they have an excuse —they’ve been at sea!
Somehow, without ever quite letting go of the woman or the little girl, the bearded man bowed. “Honored Ones!” he said, in a warm voice that could be heard to the back of the crowd, “I am Forolin, merchant of the city of Ahtarra. And this is Adeyna, my beloved wife, who also greets you in great respect—and my daughter, Kestil. We—there was another, born just after the Sinking, but—” Realizing he was babbl
ing, Forolin stopped. His chin twitched briefly. “We give thanks to the gods!” He touched his heart and extended the hand skyward. “For we have found you!”
“And you are most welcome here!” said Tiriki again, as she offered further blessings to the trio. “Forolin, Adeyna—and let this welcome be a personal one, for I have a little daughter of my own, just over a year old. Perhaps Kestil will like to play with Domara?”
“Indeed you are welcome,” Chedan said to Forolin. “But may I inquire where you have come from? Please tell me you have not spent two years upon the sea in that little boat!”
“No! No, indeed—” Forolin’s face grew grim again, as he delivered his daughter into his wife’s waiting arms. “We sought refuge on the mainland, in Olbairos, where my merchant house once maintained a trading station. We found it deserted, mostly, but we hoped to make a new start there. But there were so few of us—and then the plague came. We are the only ones who survived.”
“But how did you know where to look for us?” asked Chedan.
“I told you—Olbairos used to be a well-known trading station. The merchant fleet is long gone, of course, but natives still pass through there from time to time—even some from these isles. We had more than one report of others of our kind settling hereabouts.”
“More than one?” Tiriki turned toward him with a new sharpness in her voice. “You know of others?”
“Well, my lady, I have not seen them myself. And of course my informants mostly did their trading with the coastal settlements. The tribes that dwell inland are said to be strong and fierce. But it was said that several wingbirds had been sighted at Beleri’in, so we went there; it looked quite deserted, which is why we did not fight very hard when the storm drove us back out to sea. We were forced to turn west and northward, and when at last we were able to come to shore, we encountered a group of native hunters who told us you were here. As we were seeking you, your captain came to guide us in his ship. Please thank him for me! We are eternally in his debt, and yours.”