5. Andrag told Eagle he might as well remain at the inn. He would be taken to the Silver Palace the next day to meet the Master of the City and the head of the White Order.
“You will be working closely with them,” he explained. “They, of course, will want to know as much as they can about you.”
“How long am I allowed to remain in the city?” Eagle wanted to know. “From what I gathered, I should not really be here.”
“Well, no, not really,” Andrag admitted grudgingly. “But you were not to know. They will probably keep you for some time. You need to take a look at some maps and then, of course, you will have to choose the lands that will be in your care. I imagine you will want them to be somewhere south – the Bountiful Gardens, for example?”
Or the Gloom-hills, Eagle thought with a pang of regret. He knew one thing – he would never go back that way.
“No, that is too close to home. It does not do to follow the road to a place you have already left.”
Andrag’s eyes were pensive.
“No, I suppose it does not.”
“Besides,” Eagle added, “those from the Bountiful Gardens do not need much protection. There would not be a lot for a Path-finder to do.”
“Very well. We will find you another place. Somewhere you will not have many chances of getting bored.”
Andrag was back the next morning, to take Eagle to his meeting in the Silver Palace. Eagle was glad to see him. He liked Andrag. He could see he was dependable – a person one would find easy to trust.
As they walked down the busy streets, Andrag told Eagle a little about how the City of White Marble was managed. Its ruler was Lord Allar, but, even though he was lord and master of the city, no decision could be taken without him consulting his councillors. One of them was the High Priest of the White Order. It was impossible for the White Order not to have the say in how the city was run – not with their importance. The second Councillor was Lady Maya, Lord Allar’s wife. Maya’s position these days was more honorary that anything. Her health was frail. Even the best healers the city could find were worried about her. She did not take part in many councils.
“And the White Order?” Eagle wanted to know. “What do they do when they are not busy with running the City of White Marble?”
Andrag hesitated.
“Many things,” he said, and Eagle could not fail to notice the slight wariness in his voice. “Half of which I do not rightly understand.”
“And the other half, I suppose, is not fit for a stranger’s ears.”
To his surprise, Andrag shook his head.
“You are not a stranger. You are a Path-finder. We usually take Path-finders into our confidence in most things. With all the help you give us, information is the least we can offer in return.”
They reached the Silver Palace and Andrag led his guest with confident steps down the long corridor. Eagle looked around, wide-eyed. He did not know what he had expected from the Silver Palace, but this was not it. There was silence and solemnity in the vast corridors – as it should have been – but there was also something else. Something he could not quite put into words. All he knew was that it made him feel safe. It made him feel as if he had come home.
The council hall was spacious and bright. There were tapestries on the walls with patterns Eagle could not quite understand. The three people sitting in that room were a surprise to Eagle. The master of the city, Lord Allar, sat in a tall chair, flanked by his two councillors. The Lady Maya sat on his left. She looked pale and wane, her dark hair making her face even whiter. The High Priest sat on Allar’s right. His garments glimmered as if they were made of pure silver. His hair was already flaked with grey.
But Allar was younger than Eagle had expected. From all the songs people sang about him, from all the tales they told, Eagle had expected someone who had lived for centuries. Andrag bowed to the three.
“My lords, my lady, may I present to you the Path-finder Eagle?”
Saying that, he retreated but did not leave. Eagle was immensely grateful for that. He bowed low, feeling much too rustic for such an occasion. He had never been face to face with such important personages before.
“Welcome, Path-finder,” Allar greeted. “One of your kind is always needed.”
“Indeed,” the High Priest of the White Order agreed. “Especially since there are so few of you in so wide a world.”
“Adenhaas is right,” Allar said. “Not many Path-finders offer their services to us – at least, not as many as needed. That is why we are grateful for all the help we can get.”
“Well, I for one am here to offer all the help you need.”
There was a faintly scornful look on Adenhaas’ face at his words. Eagle took the chance to examine the priest of the White Order for the first time. His face was fair, but hard. His eyes glimmered shrewdly. Eagle looked away. There was something about Adenhaas he did not quite like. His expression was too calculated. It reminded him too much of Adar. He supposed no one became a High Priest of any order without being if only a little prone to scheming.
“Before you can help us, we first need to instruct you in your job,” Allar said. “And then, of course, you will have to choose the place you wish to have in your care. This will take two weeks. In the meantime, we have sent for the closest Path-finder. He will spend a year with you.”
Eagle stiffened, suddenly afraid.
“Is he also from the desert?” he asked uncertainly.
Allar and Adenhaas exchanged amused looks.
“Why, of course he is,” Adenhaas said. “There are no Path-finders born in what you call the World Without. We have often wondered why that is so, but we have found no answer to this so far.”
Eagle did not know what to feel. This would be the first time he was meeting someone from the desert since his exile. A part of him knew that, since this Light-tender was there, it meant he too had been exiled. Either that, or he had left the desert of his own accord. But this was like his old life was pulling him back into it. And he was not sure he wanted something like that.
6.But before Eagle could meet this new Light-tender, he had to choose a place to look after – and learn a few more things about the workings of the World Without. He thought he knew plenty about it already – but his knowledge came mostly from rumours and stories. Even the most accurate might not be completely truthful.
The accounts in the Royal Library, though, those were a different matter altogether. Used as he was with the room stacked with books from the Temple of the Sun Gods, he was quite taken aback by the Royal Library in the City of White Marble. He had been expecting a chamber in the Silver Palace – perhaps not even a very big one. But the Royal Library was a building in itself – bigger than the palace.
Its walls were covered in shelves of books – leather bound books, tomes with golden covers, ancient scrolls with crumbling pages like last year’s fallen leaves. The Royal Library was always adding to its collection, so Andrag informed him. There was a room there where people stayed for days on end copying books. There were people who went all over the world in search of stories to bring to the City of White Marble.
The place fascinated Eagle. He wished he could spend his entire life there, pouring over the treasures he could find on every shelf. But, unfortunately, that was not his purpose.
He was taken to a small room – so he could study in peace, without being distracted – and he was given all the maps and treaties he could ask for on the World Without. They were different from the accounts he read in the desert. Those had been informative but fraught with propaganda, full of warnings against the evils of the lands that weren’t under the rule of the Desert Gods. These, however, were clear and objective notes and maps – the good as well as the bad.
He spent his days pouring over the maps. He looked at the lands he had left behind, the Bountiful Gardens and Gloom-hills, even though he had sworn to himself never to go back there. He searched for the Merchants’ Citadel and the forests that surrounded it. He inspected the steep mountains that enclosed the City of White Marble. And his eyes were drawn further north, to places he had never seen before.
In that direction the lands were empty. There were some settlements with suggestive names, such as Last Village or Marsh-town, but these were scattered here and there, with great expanses of wilderness between them. Someone wanting to travel to the City of White Marble would be hard put to it. Even those travelling in large groups could have trouble reaching the city in one piece.
In the evenings, Andrag came to him. He led Eagle around the city, showing him the hidden corners visitors did not often get to see. He talked about all the alliances the City of White Marble was part of, and all the good things it was doing in the world.
Eagle enjoyed his company, and not only because of all the stories he had to tell. He and Andrag were alike in many ways. Andrag was an errand-bearer. He travelled from place to place with messages from the City of White Marble. He knew the vast wilderness almost as well as Eagle. Although he actually had a home. He belonged to the City of White Marble so completely, Eagle had trouble imagining him anywhere else.
Eagle found himself opening up to Andrag. He told him things he had never shared with anyone before – not even with Carys. Andrag was the first to learn of the reason why he was in exile. Eagle knew he would understand. He was one for whom doing the right thing mattered a lot.
“It must have been hard for you,” Andrag commented. “To have to choose between your duty and your conscience. To know you could face death or a life in exile. That is never easy.”
“No,” Eagle agreed fervently. “It never is.”
It was almost night time. They were both standing on the steps in front of Andrag’s house. The stars were out, and the air was fresh, with the smell of young flowers from the mountains. Andrag was looking at the sky.
“I suppose uprooting yourself like that cannot be easy, either,” he went on thoughtfully. “Leaving your home for foreign parts – you cannot really expect that to be a choice one would make without hesitation, can you?”
Eagle glanced at his friend curiously. There was something in his voice that told him this was more than just sympathy for the Light-tender’s plight.
“I think you have a story on your mind,” he remarked cautiously.
Andrag huffed and shook his head. He was no longer looking at Eagle. His eyes were lost somewhere far into the night.
“Are the stars different for you?” he wanted to know. “Are they the same stars you saw in the desert?”
Eagle shook his head. He had noticed it, too. The stars changed, becoming different from the patterns he was used to. He could still recognise some of them, but not all, and not at the right times of the year. It used to frighten him more than anything else at the start of his exile.
“They are different from the stars that shine above the Merchants’ Citadel, too.” Andrag went on. “Have you ever been there?”
“I could have gone once. I didn’t in the end.”
“I have. Plenty of times. My first errand was there. I needed quite a lot of help, at the time. And there was this spice merchant – one of the leaders of the citadel. He helped me with everything. He became a good friend. And a while ago I asked for his daughter’s hand in marriage. They both agreed.”
Eagle stood silent. He could not help remembering Carys and Lusa. There was a slight twinge of envy towards Andrag. It was not that he thought he deserved more than his friend. But he realised that, however much he and Andrag might be alike in most things – Andrag could afford to build himself a home. He could be on the road for months – but he always returned to the same place.
“I wonder if it is wise, though,” Andrag went on, oblivious of the effect his words had on Eagle. “I mean – I am uprooting Lorla. I am asking her to leave the place she was born in and come spend her life somewhere completely unfamiliar – where even the stars are not the same.”
Eagle thought of his own parents. Malna did not live in a different village, so there had been no issue of uprooting her. But there was Rashed’s pact with the Rain Goddesses, and for the first time Eagle was forced to wonder if Rashed had paused to consider how Malna would feel about his decision. Hadn’t he realised she would never be pleased with giving her firstborn away? No mother ever was.
Eagle was no longer bitter about how Rashed had not taken into consideration his own feelings. After all, it was hard to imagine the feelings of one who did not exist yet – who might never exist. But what about Malna? Had he spared a thought for her?
And here was Andrag, fretting about taking someone away from her home and bringing her to a place where, by all accounts, no one could feel lonely for long. Suddenly, he was overwhelmed by the need to reassure his friend in any way he could.
“Don’t worry,” he said quickly. “This is the City of White Marble. You cannot be homesick for long here.”
Andrag finally wrenched his gaze from the star-filled sky. He turned to Eagle, thoughtfully.
“Really?” he asked in an uncharacteristic fit of uncertainty.
Eagle nodded firmly.
“Really. Now tell me more about Lorla. I wish I could see her for myself.”
“You should see her,” Andrag agreed, a rare smile brightening his features. “And perhaps you will. When you bring travellers to the City of White Marble, stop by the guardhouse and we will come to meet you. Lorla and I – and our children, if we are blessed with them. They will be future errand-bearers too, of course. All my family have been errand-bearers for generations.”
Eagle listened to Andrag, feeling inexplicably happy. He could almost forget he would have to leave again soon and resume his life of loneliness.
Copyright Simina Lungu 2022
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