The Hall of Whispers was small by the standards of Raven Lake. Its stone ceiling was low, and there were no grand structures herein; only low-slung curbs of wood that demarcated regular spaces throughout the chamber. Here, far from the fires of the Ix-akad, the air was cooler, and rush mats served to cushion not against heat but against the cold stone underneath.
The room was quiet, but hardly vacant. Groups of druids spoke together in low voices, or sat alone with their limbs folded in prayer or contemplation. Some moved singly or in pairs through the steps of some slow, silent dance.
Nowhere was there a voice raised above a murmur. I knelt atop woven reeds that bit into my knees when I shifted my weight, kneeling in imitation of the pose the Elders had adopted. Natural dark was punctuated by candles and rushlights throughout the quiet enclosures. The effects of this communal gloom were profound; I felt as though I knelt in the depths of some forgotten chapel.
I lifted my head. Grannine lifted Hers.
“Gafed-Elder,” I said. Now that the Grey Speech was better-known to me, I recognized some of the words that left my mouth, though it was no less eerie to hear my voice shaping the sounds of a foreign tongue with an accent more like Dermot’s than my own. “Some of my people wish to serve the Hold as Hunters.”
Properly, her title was Mox-dirac Gafed-kol-torex Gim-Alarmecanin. Elder-Master Gafed of Raven Lake, the Voice of Druids. It was a ponderous title even by the standard of our hosts, but she bore it the same way she bore her plain and unornamented robes, the manner in which she bore the elaborate tattoos that covered her hands—coolly, calmly, and with an unassailable air of disdain.
She was tall, and dark of complexion, with pale grey eyes that flashed from her features when she looked this way or that. Her hair was closely cropped down to a strip of prominent silver at the center of her skull, a sharp contrast against her skin.
She wore no finery, very nearly no jewelry at all save for a single minute piercing of black-and-blue druidstone through the upper rim of her left ear. She had a wiry, vigilant strength in the set of her shoulders that was more reminiscent of an old soldier than a wizened mystic.
She had a fine, strong nose which she used exclusively to look down upon me.
“Unproven Children of Seven in the Forest?” she said. Once again I heard not a word of the Grey Speech that left her lips: Grannine translated each consonant and connotation to me in perfect mimicry of the old woman’s denigratory tone. The Elder made a fleeting motion of her hand which I recognized—the dismissive slash of a casual ve berem, the sign to ward ill-fortune. She continued. “Our Hunters would need to keep double-watch to ensure they do not escape. Your people know the Church. They will wish to return to what is known. This is the nature even of animals.”
She laid out each of these thoughts with the conviction of natural law.
I began to gather a rebuttal, marshalling to make an argument of which I myself was still not yet convinced, but before I could come to the defense of my people, our third interlocutor stirred.
His title was simpler, and had been rendered to me by Grannine as Life-Waker. A bald and bright-eyed old man, he, too, wore little in the way of ornamentation beyond a necklace of dry and woven grass.
“This is foolish,” Elder Kova made a calming gesture to Gafed. He had a rough, passionate voice. “Even a child must learn to hunt before they are named Hunter. Let Meteth Lord-Hunter train them. In this, they will be known, and we will learn the character of these Hunters.”
Elder Gafed made a sound under her breath which Grannine did not translate. It did not sound complimentary. She looked up as if searching for patience upon the ceiling.
“Do your people know that our Hunters do not only shed blood? It is not a position of war. Our Hunters are the arms and eyes of our Hold, and by them we are fed in the winter.”
“They understand this, Gafed-Elder,” I said carefully. “They wish to help this Hold, as you have helped us.” “So it is written,” Elder Kova beamed as though blind or immune to the unsmiling gaze that Gafed did not fix upon me. “To truly thrive is to thrive in harmony.”
Grannine knelt at my side untroubled by the cold stone, by the rush mats. In the dim cavern I almost thought could see the light Her eyes shed as She looked to and fro. She reached out and set Her hand on mine. My heartbeat was quickening, rising to the challenge of this back-and-forth.
I took a deep breath.
“My Elders,” I said, again in their tongue. “The hall below, where the well and the spring are kept—you have a bath such as I have only heard mentioned in the oldest convents of our Church.”
Gafed let out a sound that was akin to a laugh in form, if not in feeling.
“Continue,” she said, with a fractional motion of her hand.
“Some of my people wish to clean themselves in this place.”
“Naturally they must,” Gafed retorted. “We will clean them not; they must clean themselves.”
Fire blossomed behind my eyes. Slowly and steadily, a thrilling scarlet pain was building at the back of my skull. I shook my head and squeezed Grannine’s hand in mine. The gift of tongues Grannine had given me was essential for our survival in Raven Lake, but to endure it overlong was deeply taxing—to say nothing of these exchanges which I was also obligated to endure.
“These baths are shared all together, Elders,” I said. As I fell into the flow of the Grey Speech, the pain in my head lessened. “My people are not accustomed to bathing in this way—we would like your permission to erect a shelter, or a veil, that the women among us may use the waters.”
“This, now, is foolishness,” Gafed darted a brilliant glare at Kova, who endured it pleasantly. “We deny you. Those waters are for all children of Raven Lake, and you are children of Raven Lake. I will not see them divided, nor set apart.”
I felt my temper building. A flare of heat in my heart, or perhaps in the gem buried upon my breast.
“You are gracious, Gafed-Elder,” I told her, and I saw her lip curl. “But my people, our ways are not yours. We do not…” My headache began to reassert itself. “We do not mingle together, man and woman unclothed. It is forbidden.”
“By who is it forbidden? This is the way of druids, and you are children of Raven Lake. Here you may discard the superstitions of your fleeting Church.”
“It is not a question of—” I felt a shock of scarlet fury run down my spine. “Elder, I ask this so that our women may feel safe and at peace. And our men. To force both to–”
“To feel at peace!” Gafed interrupted, incredulous.
“Softly, softly, Gafed my friend,” Kova said. “They are young to us, and they have suffered.”
She excoriated him with a look that might have skimmed the cream off milk. Her brilliant grey eyes returned to me in a flash of emotion that might have been either frustration or contempt.
“Suffering begets ill-teaching. Mariead must learn it justifies not her peoples’ ill-behavior.”
I saw a halo of red at the edges of my vision. My own temper flared so bright that I thought I spoke without thinking—but it was not my voice that answered.
“Suuna’astrea Mariead,” Grannine corrected, with a hauteur I had never heard from my voice before. Her tongue spoke through my mouth. Panic took hold in some deep and secretive part of my mind as I felt Her lips curl mine in a frigid smile, as I tasted sulfur smoke on the parting breath of Her retort. “She is owed at least that title, Gafed, if she is owed not your hospitality.”
My heart struck a single cold beat as though gripped in an unseen fist. I thought for a moment that Elder Gafed might stop breathing altogether. She became very silent, and very still, for nearly too long. I opened my mouth to utter some apology, some disclaimer—but my tongue would not obey. I sat frozen in the grip of Her glare, my eyes fixed on the Voice of Druids.
“Suuna’astrea Mariead,” Gafed exhaled the word as though to avoid breathing it in, gathered herself, and once again lifted her chin. “Your people have nothing to fear here. We are all alike at Raven Lake, and need not these precautions.”
“Gafed, my friend,” Kova said. “I see no harm in this request.”
“You see no harm,” Gafed repeated, in the tone of an indictment. “I do.”
“New life demands shelter, Voice of our People,” Kova gestured to Grannine as I watched from Her. “This new suuna’astrea has begged shelter from us, and we granted it in the youth of her power. Her people are young to us, and their beginning must be safeguarded. Power speaks through her, reminding us to respect her title. This is a strong omen. Perhaps a temporary screen could be built, that the men may bathe all together without fear?”
“There is no sense in these distinctions.” Gafed made a gesture of negation once again, more forcefully. “I will not have them infect our people. It will set us apart.”
Each retort in this exchange was declared with a weight often granted solely to scripture. To watch the Elders debate was like watching iron shaped beneath a smith’s hammer; the inflexible beaten by the inexorable until one or the other surrendered. Elder Kova’s laugh was a thrilling disruption of the exchange, a sidestep of Elder Gafed’s visible frustration.
“If these children of seven have not bathed, they will already be set apart.” Neither Gafed nor I joined in his merriment, but Grannine turned my head to regard him. “The Maker-Master may find an artisan to help them build this screen of rushes. A year and a month will pass before the water tears it apart. When it does, perhaps some of our children of seven will join us.”
Grannine’s grip on me slackened, and I found that my voice was my own. I shivered.
“I…thank you, Elders,” I said, careful to cloak my gratitude with platitude. “My people will be glad to hear of your willingness to help us join you.”
Gafed’s mouth narrowed to a stern line.
“Your thoughts are for those who will join us,” she said to Kova, as though I had not spoken at all. “My fears are of those who will not.”
“Life’s way is integration, Gafed. In time.”
“Higher animals are not subjects of life alone.”
“Elders.” A pulse of pain ran through my temple. “If I may ask another favor?”
“Yes, suuna’astrea,” Elder Kova said, still smiling. Gafed uttered a single explosive breath of frustration, but did not deny me.
“It is difficult for us to speak your language. Rina has helped us much, but she is only one Speaker, and we are sixty.” Constructing a sentence in the Grey Speech was beginning to feel unwieldy, unfamiliar—yet the thoughts I had to convey needed a nuance which I could not yet achieve with my own voice. “Is there a teacher, someone who speaks our language? We would welcome more help.”
“Sixty is few for a Speaker,” Elder Gafed said. “In all of Raven Lake, there are twenty Speakers. You say Rina does much for you. I say she can do more.”
“It will be considered,” Elder Kova said. I demurred. “How else can we aid our new children?”
Gafed made a fleeting, dismissive gesture.
“Nothing more,” I said, fighting to keep an impassive expression. “We have learned you keep farms here. We have some farmers who desire to help. When the time comes to sow and plough, we are ready. That is all I wished to say.”
“More hands in the fields are ever welcome,” Elder Kova said, brightening. “I will remember this kindness.”
“More hands next summer,” Elder Gafed rose to her feet, dismissive once again. If age pained her as she did so, she did not show it, unless I misread the tightening of her features when she looked upon me. “The burden on our stores is now.”
Grannine’s arms encircled me from behind. Gently, she grasped my arms, my wrists, my shoulders, and lifted me to my feet. A hellish light bloomed from the cabochon stamped into my chest, a faint scarlet glow that shone between the threads of my shawl.
The mark of Grannine.
I wondered if this light were visible to those watching, or if it was a portent for my eyes alone. In either case, I saw no hint of deference from Elder Gafed.
“Suuna’astrea,” she said tightly. She offered the least deferential bow I had ever seen. Before I could reply, she turned her back on me.
“Suuna’astrea,” Elder Kova echoed. He came forward, hands outstretched. His palms were cool, dry to the touch, scarred many times over. He beamed, and pressed my hands in his.
“I am honored,” he said, in the tongue of the Church. He spoke it as though each word were druidic, casting the vowels wide. “Again we have a suuna’astrea in Raven Lake. You bless us.”
“I am glad to. I feel I have done little to grace my hosts thus far.”
“Do not fear my friend Gafed,” he said, in his own tongue once again, forcing another flicker of bright pain through my skull as Grannine translated.
“I fear only that she is right. We are no help to you now.”
“Burdens, stores, resources.” He made the ve berem with his hand, dismissing the thought. “You are children of Raven Lake. We deny not our children food. If we have need of more, Meteth Lord-Hunter will find more.”
I bowed. My head still ached.
“Thank you, Kova-torex. Sime-sala.”
“Xix’thiir, suuna’astrea. A bright life to you.” Elder Kova bowed again.
I bowed as best as might be seemly while making my escape.
Grannine flitted along at my side through the Hall of Whispers. Her every footstep seemed to raise a faint glow of scarlet upon the ground, and the illumination of Her hair and eyes glanced in highlights off the stone.
“‘Nothing more?’” Grannine quoted, gracing me with the impression of a smile.
“I refuse to give her the satisfaction of denying us again. We can look into the rest of Faith’s concerns together.” I reached out a hand for Her, not for power, simply for the warmth of Her touch.
Her arms enfolded me from behind, Her chin came to rest atop my head, and I stopped still in the middle of the Serale-akad, closed my eyes. “Remind me…there was something for Astrid, and…”
“Mm,” Grannine made a faint sound of acquiescence which I knew to be an artifice. She could have answered my question in the instant it was answered. Instead, She shifted behind me, out of sight, to lower Her voice to my ear. I took another steadying breath. “Aidan Whitesmith asked if there was tin here for working. Astrid, if it would be permitted to feed strangers’ children. Father Zachary would like ink and paper for writing—and there were other requests like his, which might be best-suited for Lorsala.”
“Thank you. I’ll…” I took a breath. “We’ll start with Rina.”
“Rina will likely start with you,” Grannine murmured, amused.
“What does that mean?” This earned me a look from the nearest druid. I raised my hands in silent apology and resumed our walk through the Hall of Whispers.
“She mentioned she would find you today when you have finished with the Elders. And,” Grannine’s presence faded, and She flickered into view at my right hand once again, stooping to look me in the eye. “I’m reminding you that you should present her with the books we’ve been reading.”
“Blast.” I rubbed my temple, picking my way around to the entrance of the cavern. “I’d meant to mention it last night, but—”
Too late, I realized what Grannine had meant.
A dark, regal woman waited for us upon the threshold of the Serale-Akad, both hands hanging easily at her sides. She stood upright, radiating a sense of calm assurance. She wore a woolen mantle patterned with black and gold, breeches and boots of supple deerskin. A steel druid’s sigil hung on a leather strap at her neck, and her hair was woven up and back around a long amber pin. There were circles under her dark eyes.
I let my shoulders slump in exaggerated dismay. She burst out laughing.
“Oli, Acrurina-al.” I reached out to clasp her hands. Grannine’s palms threaded over mine, joining in the greeting.
“Olem, safi-dae,” Rina said. The faint lines at the corners of her eyes deepened. “Ux Xifed—today I see you as Life-That-Endures.”
“Today, she’s life without nourishment,” Grannine said. “My Mariead, perhaps you’d consider breaking your fast? Little fire to be had without fuel, and you’re still on the mend.”
I grimaced. Rina caught my frown with eyes as sharp as a marsh-hawk.
“Ah, your astrea speaks! What omen does She grant us?”
“She reminds me I haven’t had a scrap of food since dawn.”
Rina laughed again. Her voice was warm like burnished copper.
“Ai, suuna’astrea, how you suffer for your people! Come. I will find you food.”
The Beast-Hall was near. Its entrance yawned a few paces behind Rina, the tripartate junction of the Store-Hall and Hall of Whispers. Torches and rushlights glowed sparingly throughout that chamber beyond, and the smell of animals was stronger at this intersection. Eris was somewhere in that long, dim expanse, tending to the livestock of Raven Lake, or perhaps seeking new stories from some keeper of beasts.
I wavered. We have much to ask of Rina. There is still much to do. Later. I’ll find her later.
Rina tugged on my arm. I followed.
*
BLANK SLATE 
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