Eyes of Crow (22 page)

“All of Kalindos. Except the children, of course. They’re not old enough to consent to such a bargain.”

“How long—” Rhia felt sick. “How much time did I take from them?”

“It depends how long you live. Spread among the adult villagers, if you live another thirty-five years, to be my age—which I pray you will—that’s scarcely more than a month of life each.”

A month. She had stolen a month from each Kalindon. One fewer month to hold their children, to raise their faces to the afternoon sun, to sleep in their beloved’s arms.

“Why would they?”

“Because a Crow is a rare and valuable thing. A Crow is, frankly, worth five Otters or ten Wolves.”

“It’s true,” Marek’s voice came from the darkness, where he stood guard.

“It’s not true,” Rhia said. “We each have equal gifts to offer our people.”

“Equally necessary, perhaps, but not equally common.” Coranna wagged a finger at her. “So take care of yourself.”

“Take care of myself? When every day I live, someone else lives one day fewer? How can I live, knowing what I’ve stolen from them?”

“You didn’t steal it. They gave it.”

Rhia looked toward Marek, then shifted closer to Coranna. “What about him?” she whispered. “When his mate and the baby—”

Coranna held up a hand to silence her. “Marek?” she called into the dark. “Would you please fetch my ceremonial robe? It may need to be steamed before the funeral tomorrow.”

Marek replied his assent. After several moments, long enough for him to move out of hearing range, Coranna turned to Rhia, her face pinched.

“He tried. He tried to give his life for the woman and their child. He pleaded with me. But for Crow to trade one life for two, especially when one was just born—it asked too much of the Spirit. Their lives would not have been long, and the bargain would have killed Marek in that moment. I couldn’t let him go.” Her lower lip trembled once. “So I didn’t.”

“What about other people here? Couldn’t they have given life to save them?”

“It must be done within a few instants of death, the way it was with you. For them, there wasn’t time.”

Rhia turned away and hid her face in her hands to staunch the tears before they could flow.

Coranna stepped closer. “You will learn to stand at a distance from others’ pain.”

“I don’t want to.”

“You must, to give them the strength they need.” She took Rhia by the shoulders and turned her. “You can show compassion without becoming…”

Hysterical?
Rhia thought.
Deranged?

“…occupied.”

I don’t want this,
she pleaded to Crow.
How can I ever?

Coranna’s grip tightened. “Remember how happy Etar looked when he crossed to the Other Side?” Rhia nodded, though she recalled how Etar’s smile had vanished the moment before Crow’s wings shrouded him. “That’s our reward,” Coranna continued. “And when the villagers look to us tomorrow for solace, and we grant it to them, then their gratitude, their peace, will take away the hurt.”

Rhia stared at Etar’s corpse, her own body filling with dread. “Would he have lived another month if you hadn’t brought me back?”

Coranna’s mouth opened in a silent gasp. “There are some questions,” she said finally, “that only Crow can answer.”

The night’s hours crawled by, making Rhia long for summer’s generous sunlight. The torches surrounding the pyre played shadows over the forest floor, matching the specters dancing within her own mind. Not since the second night of her Bestowing had she felt so alone and confused. Guilt nagged at her as she wondered what Etar could have done with one more month of life. Now that he was dead, would other Kalindons shoulder an even larger time burden? She tried to believe that her ignorance of the ritual’s true cost made her blameless. Failing that, she reminded herself that the deed had been done and there was no use agonizing over it now. But in fact the consequences grew every day she went on living.

One of the torches wavered in the corner of her eye, and she turned to it just as Marek spoke her name.

He tugged her arm. “Come over here for a moment.”

She glanced at Coranna, who nodded and returned to whatever prayer or meditation they had interrupted.

Marek led her outside the circle of torches. He whispered in her ear, “My mentor Kerza needs to speak with you. Alone.”

“Etar’s sister?”

“Tell Coranna you need to visit the outhouse, the one on the north side of the village. Kerza will meet you there. You won’t see or hear her until she speaks. She’ll know if it’s safe to show herself.”

Rhia assented and returned to the pyre. After a short while, she excused herself, picked up one of the smaller torches, and made her way to the outhouse.

As she neared it, a woman’s whisper beckoned from behind the small wooden building. Rhia followed the sound until a hand gripped her wrist. Though she’d been expecting contact, she nearly yelped in surprise.

“Thank you for coming,” Kerza said. “I didn’t know who else to turn to.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I should show myself, so you’ll believe me. I think it’s safe.”

A white-haired woman appeared beside her, hazel eyes reflecting more than sorrow. They burned with bitterness.

“Help me,” Kerza said. “My brother was murdered.”

Rhia was surprised at her own lack of surprise. “I wondered that myself.”

“I don’t wonder.” Kerza’s whisper sliced the air. “I know. He was poisoned.”

“Who did it?”

“Someone on the Council.” She made an impatient gesture with her hands. “Let me explain. My brother and I both sit—I mean, he
sat
on the Council.” Her voice shook. “He had been the elected leader for five three-year terms.”

“Fifteen years? In Asermos our Council leadership rotates at least every two terms. That way no one person can impose their will for too long.”

“Exactly. A few Council members have proposed such term limits. The measure has been defeated again and again, always on a four-to-three vote.” Her gaze lowered. “If I’d known this would be the result, I would have changed my vote. But he’s my brother—he
was
my brother—and I had to be loyal to him.”

Rhia nodded. “You think someone killed Etar because they thought it was the only way to get him out of power.”

Kerza pressed her lips together in a tight line, as if holding back a storm of sobs.

Rhia touched her hand. “Why are you telling me this? Why do you think I of all people can help you?”

The Wolf woman drew in a deep, shaky breath through her nose. “The three Council members who tried to pass the measure were Zilus the Hawk, Razvin the Fox…”

Rhia’s eyes widened. Could the man who abandoned her mother and brothers still harbor such treachery?

“…and Coranna.”

Rhia let go of Kerza’s hand and stepped back. “You don’t think—”

“I don’t know what to think. But I know you spend time with Razvin and Coranna. All I ask is for you to keep your eyes open. Tell Marek what you learn, and he’ll tell me.” She grasped Rhia’s elbow, her fingers like claws. “You owe Coranna your loyalty. But a Crow’s greatest duty is to the dead.” Kerza suddenly cocked her head to the side. Her nostrils flared. “Someone’s coming. I must go.”

She disappeared, winking out in a moment rather than shimmering, as Marek did at sunset. The hand released Rhia, who reached out to feel the air around her. Nothing.

Her merely human senses told her no one was approaching, but she crept into the outhouse just the same, as if it were her purpose all along. She locked the door, then sat on the wooden seat, listening, too frightened even to relieve herself.

If Etar’s death had been dealt by a purposeful human hand, rather than the whim of Crow’s flight, then it could not be Rhia’s fault. No one ever spoke of murder as Crow’s will—illness, accidents, even wars could be the result of spiritual forces beyond any individual’s control. But Crow did not raise the hand of one man to slay another. To believe otherwise would exonerate the murderer as a mere tool of the Spirits.

She gathered her nerve and crept back to the pyre, where Coranna waited, as still as the stone beside her and the body that lay upon it.

When the eastern horizon began to glow, the village came to life. Waiting at the pyre, Rhia saw distant figures descend ladders from their homes. As they approached, each person, even the children, bent to pick up as many branches and twigs as he or she could carry.

Coranna stood at the head of the pyre, now in the pure white ceremonial robe that Marek had fetched for her. Crow feathers lined the seam that ran from her wrists to her neck. She gestured for Rhia to take a position at the pyre’s foot.

The sun rose over the hillside, casting a red-orange glow that outshone the torches’ pale brilliance. Coranna softly intoned the chant of the body, while one by one, the Kalindons approached the pyre, mounted the platform and stood for a few moments next to the body. They uttered hushed prayers, then placed the wood they had gathered next to the pyre. Some lay flowers or herbs on Etar’s chest.

Last to proceed were Etar’s sister and children. They all bore cropped hair and looked as if they had not slept. Kerza avoided Rhia’s gaze. The three each placed an owl feather on his breast, tucking them into the blanket so they wouldn’t blow away. Then they took their places nearby, standing rather than kneeling, no doubt because of Thera’s pregnancy.

Coranna held her arms out to the crowd. “We gather to mourn Etar’s death and celebrate his life, for both shall touch us forever. It is on our behalf alone, not his, that we mourn, for Etar himself has journeyed to the Other Side, to a new and glorious existence.” She lowered her arms. “He was a man of wisdom, of humor, of justice. His service on the village Council lasted twenty years, most of them as leader, the longest tenure in memory. He found ways to fulfill our people’s wishes and still be true to his Spirit. If I may speak for all Council members, we have been blessed and humbled by his service.”

The other elders nodded—including Razvin. His piety and grief had a forced quality—at least to Rhia—as if he were trying too hard to mourn. She couldn’t identify Zilus the Hawk, and as for Coranna…the thought that she could be a murderer was too terrible.

Other Kalindons came forward to speak of Etar, extolling his wisdom and lamenting the void that he had left behind. His son Pirrik told of Etar’s devotion to his late wife, who had preceded him to the Other Side seven years before.

When Pirrik stepped down, pale and unsteady, Coranna returned to the head of the pyre. “We will now sing home his soul.”

She began the chant to call Crow, as Galen had at Mayra’s funeral. Rhia joined in, tentatively at first, in case the words or inflections differed from those of her home, but this ritual was identical even to the rhythms of the breath. Soon the others lifted their voices to the cold morning air.

Unlike the day they buried her mother, a crow appeared right away calling over and over. Rhia watched it swoop low through the forest, passing through patches of morning sun that glistened violet off its wings.

For a moment she wished she could follow it into the sky. Then she looked at the grateful faces of the Kalindons, the people who had given up a bit of their lives for her, and knew with certainty that her place was in this world.

She laid an armful of dry wood at the foot of the pyre and examined the raised stone platform on which it stood. It bore the scorch marks of many funerals—she wondered how many bodies had turned to ashes here. Her mind cleared, and she felt the traces of souls who had lingered close to earth after the deaths of their bodies. One remained.

Coranna stepped quietly onto the platform next to her. “We have enough wood for now. Marek is making a reserve pile in case the night is damp.”

Rhia kept her gaze on Etar’s face. “Why do some of them stay?”

“A few wait because of unfinished business or an over-attachment to this world. It’s part of a Crow person’s duty to encourage them to cross over completely.”

“Why has he stayed?”

Coranna hesitated. “Perhaps he wants to see his grandchild born.”

“I hope that’s why.” Rhia wanted to utter the alternative—he remained because someone had shoved him from this world.

“Etar has not spoken to me from the Other Side,” Coranna said. “If he lingers after Thera has her baby, I will contact him to determine his soul’s intentions.”

Rhia forced herself to ask, “Why not now?”

Coranna gave her a long look. “I need privacy, and special materials. I prefer to perform that ritual at home.”

“Tomorrow, then? I’ll help with anything you need.”

The Crow woman’s gaze darkened. “Tomorrow, yes.”

Rhia gestured to Etar. “Do they ever stay for good?”

“No. Crow wouldn’t allow it.” Her head gave a little bow. “Our Spirit’s patience and understanding are enormous as it is.”

Rhia bowed her head in imitation and restrained her thousand-and-one other questions.

“We’re finished for now,” Coranna said, loudly enough for Marek to hear. “Go and join the wake, both of you.”

Rhia stepped off the platform and turned to Coranna. “Are you coming?”

“I’ll be along shortly.” Coranna turned back to the pyre, and as she did, the façade of composure fell from her face.

When they were out of her earshot, Rhia told Marek, “I spoke with Kerza last night.” She hesitated, not knowing if she could tell Marek she questioned his Wolf mentor’s motives. But if she couldn’t trust the man who had been willing to give up everything for her, she was truly alone here.

“I don’t know who to believe,” she said. “Kerza suspects Coranna and Razvin, and someone named Zilus.” He nodded. “But why should I believe Kerza?” she asked him.

“What she says is true, about the term limit conflict. Council meetings are public.”

“I’ve asked Coranna to contact Etar.” To his surprised look she replied, “He still lingers near this world. Maybe he has something to tell us.”

“I hope so. It’s a lot of rituals for Coranna to do in such a short time. She brought you back to life, now she’s handling the funeral of one of her best friends—”

“Were Coranna and Etar more than friends?”

“Sometimes.” They glanced back at Coranna’s figure, glowing white in a patch of sunlight. “He’s the closest person to her to die since her daughter.”

“I didn’t know about her daughter.” Shame coursed through her, for her indifference and suspicions. “I never asked Coranna about her.”

“Them, not her. Coranna had two daughters, but only one survived to have her own children. The younger daughter died before I was born, a fever of some sort. The older one died in the same fire that killed my parents. Coranna had to call her spirit home along with all the others.”

Rhia stopped and covered her face. “I never asked you, either, how your mother and father died.”

“I didn’t expect you to. I didn’t ask about your mother’s death. Figured you’d tell me when you were ready.”

Was she ready? Ready to admit her greatest error, her deepest shame? She looked at Marek’s patient face.

“What happened to Coranna’s grandchildren?” she asked him.

“Her son-in-law took them to Tiros to live with his family. Said he wouldn’t watch his children die in this forsaken place.” Marek shook his head. “It broke Coranna’s heart. She could have gone with them, but she wouldn’t leave Kalindos. This is home, she said, for better or worse.”

Rhia looked at the mist-draped forest, at the Kalindons moving as one around the bonfire, and understood.

Bellies full and thirsts quenched, Rhia and Marek sat near the fire while Zilus the Hawk captivated the crowd with stories, most of which featured Etar as a younger and considerably less wise Owl. Zilus’s pointed gray beard bobbed as he recreated exaggerated scenes, complete with imitated voices. Before long, everyone was laughing and toasting Etar’s memory. Rhia found it hard to believe that Zilus held anything but fondness for his fellow Council member, but perhaps that was the impression he was trying to convey.

As the shadows in the forest lengthened, Zilus grew solemn, and many of the Kalindons leaned forward.

“Is this a special part?” Rhia whispered to Marek.

“He always finishes with the story of the Descendants. Likes to go out with a dramatic flourish.”

Rhia knew the story but perked up to hear how the Kalindons told it.

“Once upon a time,” Zilus said, “all people in the world were one. Everyone had animal magic the way we do in Kalindos, the way the people of Asermos do,” he gestured to Rhia, “and the people of Tiros and Velekos. We traded in peace and rarely fought, unless it was over a mate.” He nudged the elderly woman sitting next to him, who laughed and returned a soft shove.

“But one day,” Zilus continued, “a fishing party traveling south from Velekos was beset by a terrible storm that carried them out across the Southern Sea, all the way to the other shore. When the clouds lifted, the men fell on the deck of their boat and blessed the Spirits that had spared their lives. Then they stood.”

He paused and looked the children in the eye, one by one. “What do you think they saw?” he asked, drawing out each word.

Rhia knew the answer: a golden shore near the mouth of another river, a land where the weather was always warm, a paradise untouched by humans—though not for long.

“They saw,” Zilus said, “a shining city on the golden shore, a city with buildings of white stone that reflected the sun so brightly it hurt to look at it. A city that was empty.”

“Wait,” Rhia whispered to Marek, “does he mean they saw it in their imagination?”

“No.” He squinted at her. “They saw it. It was there.”

“They didn’t build the city?”

Someone behind her made a shushing noise. She pressed her lips together and leaned forward to hear Zilus tell more.

“The fishermen rowed to the city and stepped within. They walked on roads paved with solid stone and imagined how quickly their carts could roll over such paths. They saw enormous houses and imagined how quickly they could fill them with children and servants. And lastly, they came to the largest building of all. It was so huge, if you stood in the center of it, you couldn’t see the outer walls.”

The eyes of the youngest children widened at the thought.

“And in that building,” Zilus said, “were stone statues of people—men and women who each wielded a different weapon. One man, a spear, one woman, a bow and arrow. One man looked as if he held the lightning itself in his hand. The statues bore no chips, no marks, not so much as a speck of dust. It was as if the former inhabitants had vanished that very day.

“The fishermen fell to their knees, thanking these statues they thought were gods for delivering them from the storm and bringing them to this city.”

“Did the gods answer?” asked a little girl to Zilus’s left.

He tweaked her nose. “No, silly, they were just statues. But the fishermen believed they were gods. They believed so hard they brought those carvings to life in their own minds.”

“They worshiped a bunch of statues?” a boy said with disdain. “What did the Spirits do?”

“Well, that’s the sad part. The Spirits of these men felt forsaken. So they took their magic back.” Zilus’s hand snatched the air. “That’s what happens when we don’t honor them. The Spirits grant us their Aspects, and they can take them away if we aren’t worthy.” He folded his hands. “Now you’d probably like to hear what happened to the fishermen.”

Everyone nodded, although most knew the end of the story.

“They returned to Velekos and told everyone what they had seen. Word spread, to Asermos, Tiros and even to Kalindos. Many of our people were seduced by the idea of an easier life, one that would depend less on the cycles of the seasons, less on what they considered the whims of the Spirits. They left their villages for this shining white city in the south, and as they departed, so did their magic depart from them.

“And to this day, the Descendants, as we call them, have no magic.”

“Will they ever come back?” asked the little girl.

Zilus gave her a wistful half smile. “Not in peace, I’m afraid.” He raised his empty meloxa mug. “My throat is dry. I thank you for your attention, and thank you even more for refilling my drink.”

The musicians warmed up, and the crowd moved back to clear a space for dancing.

Rhia turned to Marek and drank in the sight of him while it lasted, for the sun was about to disappear. “In Asermos we’re taught that the Descendants built the white city on the shore they found. That they created the gods in their own image.”

“Interesting.” Marek frowned at the bottom of his mug, which he could see due to the absence of meloxa. “Either way, they’re there now and bound to be trouble someday.”

“But if they didn’t build the city, who did?”

“The people before the Reawakening, of course.”

The giraffe had told Rhia of such inhabitants. It was hard to doubt a Spirit, but the teachings of her childhood remained rooted inside her. “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

“Then if you ever meet a Descendant, you should ask them which is the true story.”

“Maybe neither is exactly true.”

Marek looked to the west. “Time to light the pyre, at sunset.” He took her hand. “Stay with me after I disappear?”

She kissed him, long and sweet, and when she opened her eyes, he had vanished.

Along with most of the villagers, they made their way to the pyre. Etar had been placed inside and the upper stone slab removed. Juniper branches covered and surrounded the body, along with the dry wood they had collected today.

The crowd quieted. Without a word, Coranna lowered a torch to the base of the pyre. Marek and Rhia did the same at their positions. The oil-soaked wood snapped and cracked, and the heat formed a wall that threatened to push Rhia off her feet. She stepped back from the platform and watched through the slats of the pyre as the flames ate their way toward Etar’s body.

When the fire reached the edge of his blanket, a great
whoosh
went up. Coranna had doused his garments with meloxa to hasten the flames. Bits of cloth floated upwards before bursting into small showers of ash.

Within moments, Etar’s skin cracked and blackened, peeling away from his flesh. Rhia wanted to run from the sight and the stench, which was barely allayed by the fragrant juniper branches. But no one else turned away, and no one showed disgust—only sadness—so she watched with them, honoring Etar during his body’s last moments.

The evening wind blew brisk and dry, feeding the flames’ frenzy. Eventually the corpse was little more than a charred skeleton. Each time another joint fell apart and the body shifted, Rhia jumped a little at the sudden movement. Her heart slammed against her own ribs, which she was more conscious of than ever. Inside her were the same bones that split and crumbled in the nearby flames.

Slowly the fire dwindled to embers around what little remained of Etar—many small bone fragments amid a scattering of gray ashes. The crowd dispersed, most of them heading back to the clearing to eat and drink in a greatly subdued mood.

Rhia couldn’t move, much less eat and drink. Coranna brought forth a clay container that resembled a large vase with a cover. She started to call Rhia, then stopped when she saw her face. Instead she beckoned to Marek.

Rhia forced her feet to unfreeze and took an unsteady step. Her stomach pitched at the movement, but nothing would stop her from fulfilling her duty. She approached the pyre, whose stone platform pulsed hot, and stood next to Coranna.

The Crow woman held up the clay container. “We’ll gather a bit of the ashes now, then tomorrow morning, after the stones have cooled, we’ll collect whatever hasn’t blown away.” She reached the vessel toward the pyre. “Hold my sleeve, please.”

Rhia pulled Coranna’s sleeve taut so it would not burn on the stones of the pyre’s platform. Using the rim of the container and a piece of bark, the Crow scooped up a small pile of ashes. She drew her arm back, then held the vessel in both hands while murmuring a short prayer.

Finally Coranna straightened and sighed. “I’m off to have a drink, or possibly several drinks, in Etar’s honor.” She touched Rhia’s cheek. “I suggest you retire for the night.”