Chapter 37

Jolene was standing out front when they reached the Haven the next afternoon. Her hair blew in an unruly mass around her head and she looked thinner than ever, the lines in her face stark and raw. She looked from Siena to Netra and then back to Siena, but she did not speak.

“Gather everyone, please,” Siena told Jolene. Jolene left them and Siena squeezed Netra’s arm. “Thank the Mother we’re home.”

“Yes,” Netra said, but the Haven no longer looked the same. The solid, comfortable place, the place that had sheltered and comforted her for her entire life, had changed. It looked old and fragile. It looked like it would fall down in the first hard wind. She followed Siena inside.

The Tenders of Rane Haven gathered in the common room and Siena told them everything that had happened. When she was done there was silence at the table. The nine women sat there, lost in their thoughts, trying to absorb what was happening to the world they thought they knew.

“The Voice. Some texts refer to the Guardian Gulagh as the Voice,” Brelisha said. She took a sip from her cup of tea. Her hands were shaking slightly. “Tharn is also known as the Fist. We must assume that Kasai, the last of his Guardians, known as the Eye, is out there somewhere as well.”

“I’m scared,” Donae said. She twirled her hair nervously between her fingers.

“We all are,” Siena replied.

“Well, if there was any lingering doubt that the prison is weakening, it is gone now,” Brelisha declared. She rubbed her swollen knuckles and grimaced. “It is only a matter of time.”

“It can’t be that bad. Surely Xochitl will not abandon the life she created to Melekath,” Donae said, looking from one face to another, seeking comfort somewhere, anywhere. “Surely she will save us.”

“Of course she will,” Karyn said. “Even if she has not forgiven her Tenders, she will not stand by and let Melekath destroy all Life.”

That hung in the air for a minute.

Donae pulled at her hair and shifted in her chair, her eyes darting around the table. “It seems…” She hesitated, then blurted out the rest. “You said Melekath is offering forgiveness to those people in Nelton, because they were not the ones who made war on him. Then why won’t Xochitl forgive us? We weren’t the ones who used her powers to kill. The ones who did that are all long dead.”

Brelisha turned a stern eye on her and Donae shrank in her chair. “Melekath offers only lies. You can be sure of that.” Donae nodded meekly, a child reprimanded for an outburst.

“Xochitl defeated Melekath once before,” Bronwyn said, gazing at each of them in turn as if to drive her point home. “She will do so again.”

“With the help of seven other gods,” Karyn, ever the scholar, reminded them.

          

The next morning Netra was standing outside one of the back doors of the Haven, looking at the desert and wondering why it looked so different, when Brelisha came up to her.

“You weren’t there for the vows this morning,” she said.

Netra gave her a sidelong look. Brelisha’s hair was pulled back in its usual severe bun. The morning sun cast her hawk-like features in sharp relief, outlining every wrinkle and age spot. “I don’t think I belong there,” Netra said. She felt immensely tired. She had barely slept. There was too much rushing around in her mind and it wouldn’t leave her be.

“Because of Tara.”

“Yes, Brelisha. Because of Tara. I killed her. Tenders aren’t supposed to kill. I don’t know that I am one of you anymore.”

“It’s not as simple as that,” Brelisha snapped.

Netra sighed and turned to face her. “Isn’t it?”

“You were under extraordinary pressure. You reacted. Maybe you made a mistake.”

“Maybe I made a mistake?”

“Tara had given herself to Melekath. As did those who followed him to Durag’otal. For that betrayal, Xochitl condemned them to die in the prison.”

“That’s it, then? You turn to Melekath so you’re guilty. Guilty and condemned to die”—she snapped her fingers—“just like that.”

“Though I would not put it that way, yes. Just like that.” Brelisha stood like a woman sure of her ground, sure she was right.

“To use your own words, ‘It’s not as simple as that.’”

“Explain.”

“You weren’t there. You didn’t hear the Voice. You didn’t feel its call. Tara, the rest of those people, they had no real choice.”

Brelisha faltered, her brows drawing together in a frown. “Well…perhaps…”

“And maybe there’s even more to it than that. How long since Xochitl turned her back on us? How long since she turned her back on the whole world?” She advanced a step and Brelisha fell back a step, suddenly uncertain. “How long do we have to keep paying for the sins of our ancestors? Is there no end to it?”

“We…cannot know the mind of the Mother.”

“Empty words.” Netra felt anger rising within her. “People can only live on those for so long. Then here comes a messenger from Melekath and you know what the first thing is he says? Do you?”

“No.”

“Melekath doesn’t blame you for what your ancestors did. He forgives you.”

Brelisha held her hands up in surrender, but Netra was implacable. She leaned in closer.

“Why would anyone not listen to an offer like that?” She tapped herself on the chest. “I was there. When he said those words something jumped inside me. Yes, there is a seductive power in the Voice, but maybe its real power comes from the fact that it says what we all want to hear most.”

Brelisha struggled to get herself back together. She clenched her hands by her sides. “Netra, you may have…well, there is something to what you say. Perhaps it is not so simple as that. I just…” She bit her lip, a sign of weakness Netra had never seen before. “Can we leave this for now? I came to ask you to come to your lessons. Cara is already waiting in the library.” Netra opened her mouth to refuse but Brelisha forestalled her and what she said next stunned Netra. “Please? I know I can’t compel you, I know you don’t have to, but it would mean something to me. Can you just…one more time?”

Her eyes glistened. Never had Netra seen her so vulnerable. She remembered then what Owina had said to her that night in the garment room, about ritual and the comfort it gave people in frightening times.

“Okay. I’ll come.”

She followed Brelisha to the library where Cara was sitting. Cara smiled up at her and Netra knew Cara was trying to reassure her. She wanted to reciprocate. She wanted to smile back, but she couldn’t. She took the chair next to Cara and forced herself not to pull away when Cara squeezed her hand. The truth was that ever since she’d returned from Nelton, she was finding it increasingly difficult to be near her old friend. Cara’s every gesture, every expression, seemed so needy, so clinging. She wanted to yell at her, to tell Cara that she was lost too, that she had nothing to offer her, nothing at all.

But she knew that even a hint of those thoughts and Cara would crumple and Netra already had too much guilt in her heart. She couldn’t take anymore.

Brelisha had only just begun the lesson when Cara surprised Netra, surprised Brelisha too, by the look on her face.

“There’s something that’s been bothering me since last night, Brelisha,” Cara said. “The Voice called Melekath Father.”

Brelisha’s eyebrows rose. She looked at Netra, then back at Cara.

“What does that mean?” Cara asked.

“It means nothing. Melekath lies.” Brelisha’s lips were drawn very thin. “Xochitl is the Mother.”

“At least, that’s what we’ve been told,” Netra said. Beside her, Cara looked at her in astonishment.

“You doubt this?” Brelisha’s voice was a croak.

Netra actually felt sorry for her, but she seemed to have tapped into something that had been festering in the back of her heart, something that once she started to release, she couldn’t stop. “I don’t know what I believe anymore.”

“You should be very careful if you walk down that road.” Brelisha gripped the edge of the table very tightly, as if she might topple over without it.

“Maybe he is our father,” Netra said. “Maybe everything in the Book is a lie.” Cara was pulling on her arm. Netra shook her off, staring hard at Brelisha.

Brelisha came to her feet, her face mottled. “You will not say such things in here.”

“Why not? When did it become a crime to ask questions?”

“This is beyond that. This is heresy. Xochitl created Life.”

“So we were told. But what if it’s not true?”

“I don’t want to talk about this.” Brelisha picked up the book lying on the table and held it before her like a shield.

“The world won’t go away just because you refuse to see it.”

“I understand that you’ve been through something very difficult, but—”

“No. You don’t understand. Why? Because you never leave this building. You live in here with your moldy old books and you stare at the past while ‘now’ happens all around you.”

Abruptly the air seemed to leave Brelisha. She sat down, her eyes empty. “Why are you doing this, Netra?”

“I’m only asking questions. What if the Book is full of lies?”

“Tell me why,” Brelisha said tiredly.

“You want to know why? Because I don’t know what to believe anymore!” Now it was Netra’s turn to raise her voice. “I used to think I knew what to believe, but then I went out there. Now I don’t know what’s real.” She fought sudden tears.

Brelisha put her head in her hands. “I don’t know what to tell you. Maybe it is all lies,” she said, gesturing at the walls filled with books. “But what else do we have? We have to believe something.”

“And that’s it, isn’t it? We have to believe something, so we end up believing anything.”

“Please go, Netra. Please…just go.”

Netra felt Cara’s pleading gaze on her but she turned her face away. Slowly she walked to the door. Even then she wanted to turn back and apologize. She didn’t really want to hurt Brelisha and she knew she had. Deeply. But her world had been turned upside down. Thoughts and feelings charged around wildly inside her, with a life of their own. She couldn’t hold them in any longer. She didn’t know what was happening to her.

          

Netra spent the rest of the day wandering the hills around the Haven, trying to find in nature some measure of peace. But there was none to be found. The land seemed empty of wild creatures; even the birds were curiously absent, as if everything had sensed her mood and fled before her. She tried prayer but that felt even emptier than the landscape. There were no answers to be found there. Xochitl was silent. She was always silent. Had she abandoned them completely? Did she no longer care for her children at all?

There were too many questions and no answers.

Netra sat on a stone for a while, took off her sonkrill and simply stared at it. Twice now it had saved her from a Guardian. That had to be some kind of sign from Xochitl, didn’t it? Some proof that she was watching over her offspring?

But it was only an old claw, dull in the bright light and lined with miniscule cracks she had never noticed before. The help it gave was all in her mind. She attached meaning to it, so it had meaning. Nothing more than that.

She did not put it back around her neck, but stuck it in her pocket.

When darkness fell, Netra trudged back to the Haven. The others would be at the evening meal. She did not really want to see them. She didn’t want to see Brelisha’s hurt or anger. She didn’t want to see Cara’s need. She didn’t want to see their sympathy for her. But at the same time she could not bear being alone right now. She needed something, anything, to pull her from the thoughts that tormented her.

The meal was over and they were all sitting there, trapped in some fragile, unseen net together, when Netra spoke for the first time.

“What are we going to do now?”

“What do you mean, Netra?” Siena asked gently.

Her tone irked Netra. She was not a troubled child who must be placated. Her tone was sharp when she spoke again. “I mean, what are we going to do? About Melekath. About his Guardians. About everything.”

“But what can we possibly do?” Donae cried, as if Netra had asked her personally.

“Indeed,” Brelisha said, turning on Netra with a darkness in her eyes. “What would you have us do?”

“I don’t know. I’ve been asking myself that all day. But we have to do something. The Guardians are free. One of them is less than two days from us. Maybe we should go to Qarath.”

“To get to Qarath we’d have to pass by Nelton,” Owina said. Outwardly, the older woman looked as calm and refined as ever, but there was sweat on her brow.

“And what would we find there anyway?” Bronwyn asked, sounding as if she was speaking to a thoughtless child. She was only a few years older than Netra and Cara, but she had always acted mature beyond her years. “Maybe Kasai is there. We might be walking right into a Guardian’s hands.”

“We can’t just sit here and do nothing,” Netra maintained stubbornly. “We have to do something.”

“Look around you, Netra,” Siena said. “We are not soldiers. We are not heroes. We are only a handful of women. There is nothing we can do.”

“What about all your talk about joining together with our sisters to be ready when Xochitl needs us?”

“We tried,” Siena said. “You saw what happened.”

“So now we’re just going to sit here? Wait for the end with our hands folded?”

“We will pray,” Siena said softly.

“That’s it?” Netra asked. “Pray? What good will that do?”

“More good than haring off around the countryside,” Brelisha replied sharply.

“If we are sincere, and our hearts are pure, the Mother will hear our prayers,” Owina said.

“Well, that leaves me out,” Netra said. “Now that I’m a murderer.”

A dead silence greeted her words. Netra stared around the table but only Brelisha would meet her eyes. The rest turned their faces away.

The moment stretched out, seeming to freeze in Netra’s mind. She saw them as if they were a painting. Donae, small, thin, afraid of her own shadow. Karyn, middle-aged like Donae, taking refuge as always in her intellect. Bronwyn, tall, capable, rarely rattled. Owina, prim and proper as a nobleman’s wife, but with strength hidden under the softness. Jolene, hesitant, quiet, living in a world none of the rest of them could see. Cara, her best friend, wanting nothing more than to make and keep the peace. Siena, like a mother to her. Brelisha, cold and distant, a scathing word always ready on her thin lips. They were her family and she loved them, but right then she knew she would never fit in with them again.

Netra knew that whatever they said, however they reasoned, they did nothing because they were frightened. She found herself wondering, if her mother were with them at that moment, what would she do?

She would act. This Netra knew. She would fight, even if it did no good.

At that moment, Netra made the decision that had been lurking in the back of her mind since Nelton.

She was leaving.

The thought hurt her more than she’d expected. Her whole life had been spent here, with these women. But she no longer belonged here. She had killed. In her heart she was no longer a Tender. It was a title she no longer deserved. Brelisha was saying something, arguing some point, but Netra wasn’t listening. What was the point anymore?

“Okay, Brelisha,” she said, getting to her feet. “You’re right.” Then she left the room and they stared after her.

          

 “You told her about her mother? I thought you promised Shakre you wouldn’t.”

Brelisha had followed Siena to her quarters. Siena sat down wearily and regarded the stern-faced woman.

“I had to. You should have seen her after the Windcaller left. I had to warn her.”

“Just like her mother,” Brelisha said dismissively.

“I think she deserves to know, don’t you?”

Brelisha thought about that. “Probably. But I think your timing was bad. Right now, with everything else going on.”

Siena took off her sonkrill and laid it on the desk before her. She stroked it with one finger. “There isn’t anything we can do, is there?”

Brelisha stiffened, and for a moment something very vulnerable peeked out from behind her eyes. Then it was gone. “Faith. That’s what we can do. We can hold to our faith. If the Mother has use for us, she will let us know.”

          

 “Were you going to leave without telling me goodbye?”

It was dark. The evening meal had been over for an hour. Netra was sitting on the stone bench out back of the Haven, by the garden. Siena sat down next to her. There was a great sadness in her face.

Netra started to ask how she knew, but gave it up. Siena had always known more than she let on. “Probably,” Netra said, unable to meet Siena’s eyes.

Siena sighed.

“Don’t try and talk me out of it. My mind is made up. I don’t expect you to understand.”

“I didn’t come out here to talk you out of it, Netra. I know better than that.” She sighed again. “And I think I understand better than you realize.” She took hold of Netra’s hand. “I think I always knew this day would come. Just as I always knew the day would come when your mother would leave. What is a sanctuary to us is a prison to women like you.”

“I just…I can’t be here right now,” Netra said, her voice breaking. She would not cry, she told herself fiercely. “I killed Tara. I don’t think I deserve to call myself a Tender, no matter what everyone says. And I…I want to find my mother. I have to talk to her.” She had to pause to take hold of herself. “I have to know.”

“It’s all right. You don’t have to explain yourself. You’re a grown woman now. You have a right to make your own decisions.” Siena rubbed her eyes and gave a shaky laugh. “I hope that sounded good, because it felt awful. I know I have to let you go, to let you live your own life—that’s what a real mother does—but more than anything I just want to lock you in your room and keep you here. I’m going to miss you. More than you can possibly realize.”

Then Netra did cry. She didn’t fight it when Siena wrapped her in a hug and pulled her close. “Why?” she asked brokenly. “Why?”

“I don’t know,” Siena replied, not asking which question Netra referred to. “Only you, and the Mother, know that.”

“I need some answers. I don’t know what’s real anymore.”

“I don’t think any of us knows. Oh, we act like we do. Maybe because it’s what we’re supposed to know as adults. Maybe it’s just to convince ourselves to make it through another day. But none of us knows. We just muddle through as best we can. Mother knows, that’s what I do. It might not be much, but it’s all I’ve got.”

Netra pulled back, looked at Siena through tear-stained eyes. “That wasn’t very helpful, you know.” She forced a half smile to take the sting from her words.

“Welcome to the world of adulthood. It’s that time where you realize the adults don’t know half as much as you thought they did. When you have to make real decisions and you’ve got no real idea what you’re doing.”

Netra laughed then, and cried a little more. “Do you think I’ll find her? I don’t know where to look.”

“I don’t know if it’s any help, but your mother went north and west when she left. I got the feeling she was circling around the edge of the Firkaths and going north.”

“I’ll come back.”

“Of course you will.”

Netra pulled back. It was hard to see Siena’s face. “You’re not angry with me?”

“No. I’m not angry.” She took both of Netra’s hands. “Be careful. It can be a dangerous world out there.”

“I will. You know that.”

“You’ve survived two Guardians. I don’t know what else the world can throw at you.”

After that they sat there in silence for a long time without speaking.

          

 “I know what you think of me,” Cara said.

It was late and Netra was getting ready for bed, knowing she had to tell Cara she was leaving, and dreading it. Netra looked up at Cara’s words. Her friend was sitting on her bed, her face turned down. She’d been brushing her hair and she was turning the brush over and over in her hands.

“I know you think I’m weak and afraid—”

“I don’t think—” Netra began, but Cara cut her off, her face suddenly twisting with anger.

“Stop it! Stop lying to me!”

Netra stared at her old friend in surprise, waiting for the flood of tears to start as they always did. But to her surprise, Cara’s eyes stayed dry.

“You think, ‘It’s Cara. Nice enough, but soft. Always afraid. Never standing up for herself. Nothing but a mouse.’”

“That’s too harsh,” Netra said quietly.

“Just let me finish!” Cara snapped, and Netra leaned back in surprise. “I am afraid. I don’t mind admitting that. I’m not brave like you. I wish I was, I really do. You have no idea how hard I’ve tried, but I just can’t do it. It’s not in me. I’m not you, no matter how hard I try.” She was pulling hair out of the brush with abrupt, angry motions. Then she looked up, locked eyes with Netra.

“I’m not you. I’m me. That’s all I can be. I’m sorry I can’t be more.”

Netra went over and sat beside her. Cara flinched, and then leaned against her.

“I’m sorry,” Cara said again.

“Don’t be,” Netra said. “I’m the one who should be sorry.”

“It’s just that I want people to get along. Can you understand that? I hate it when there is conflict. I just don’t understand why people have to fight. What do we gain from it? What does it get us but misery?” She was gripping the brush very tightly.

“And that’s one of your best traits, Cara. It’s part of what makes you special. Trust me, the world needs more people who feel like you do.” Surprisingly, Netra meant what she said. The truth was that she had always kind of looked down on Cara for being weak, but now she was starting to see that she had a different kind of strength in her.

“When were you going to tell me?” Cara asked. “Were you going to tell me? Or were you just going to leave?”

“I just…I couldn’t find a good way to say it.”

“I love you, Netra. You’re my sister. You’re my closest friend. All you have to do is tell me.”

“I was afraid you wouldn’t understand.”

“I don’t understand. But I’m your friend. It doesn’t matter if I understand. It’s your decision. That’s what counts. I will miss you—more than you can imagine—but I accept that it is your choice.”

Now it was Netra who began to cry. She put her arms around Cara and sobbed.

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