From Across the Clouded Range (13 page)

Seeing his son, Ipid looked up from
the contract before him. A genuine smile spread across his round
face. “Good morning, Dasen. How are you?” Surprisingly, his
question seemed genuine, and his eyes did not return immediately to
his papers.

Dasen was taken
back.
Did he really mean what he had said
last night?
“I have a bit of a headache,”
Dasen admitted cautiously. He sat at the table, expecting his
father’s eyes to bounce back to the contract, but they remained on
him. “I’m sorry to have overslept. I didn’t realize how much I had
missed having a comfortable bed.” He signaled to a server. The man
literally jumped then disappeared through the door to the
kitchen.

“
I thought you could use
the sleep,” Ipid said. “The rain has finally stopped, so,
hopefully, we’ll have an easier journey today. It can’t be much
worse.” He chuckled, obviously in a banner mood. Dasen couldn’t
remember the last time he’d shared this many civil, uninterrupted
words with his father. “Oh, would you like some coffee? It may help
your head.”

“
They have coffee here?”
Dasen looked around the inn. It was nice, but that seemed an
extravagance too far.

“
I brought a bag of beans
with us, and they’ve done a reasonable job of brewing
them.”

“
Coffee would be
welcome.”
As it would have been many other
mornings
, he thought to himself. He stared
at his father, wondering where this affable man had come from and
when he would finally turn back into the overbearing bastard he had
known for the past twelve years. “You seem in a fine mood this
morning,” he ventured.

“
I had a good night’s
sleep.” Ipid smiled. His eyes searched the room for the
server.

At that moment, Elton pushed open the
door and approached the table. “We’re ready when you are, sir.” He
looked down at Dasen and smiled. “Shall I fetch Dasen’s things? I
think that is all we’re waiting for.”

“
Certainly, Elton. But
first could you get the boy some coffee? I can’t seem to find that
server.”

Elton nodded and strode to a small
table by the door to the kitchen. Dasen enjoyed the sight of the
huge man handling the delicate silver coffee service and porcelain
cups. A moment later, Dasen had his coffee. He sipped at it. The
beans had not been ground fine enough and had been over-boiled, but
it was better than nothing. Following Elton to the table was the
server with a plate containing three fried eggs, an equal number of
round sausages, and a thick slice of toasted bread with butter and
jam. Dasen’s stomach rumbled at the savory smells. He immediately
began cutting the eggs, releasing their yolks to run across his
plate.

“
Are you excited to see
Tethina?” Ipid asked when Elton had departed up the
stairs.

Dasen felt a knot form in his stomach
that almost kept him from swallowing the bite he was chewing. No,
he wanted to say. Instead, he changed the subject. “Do you think we
will get there in time to see her today?”

“
If the weather holds. I
sent a messenger this morning to secure rooms and let her know we
would be arriving, so she should be expecting you. ”

Dasen took a large bite to spare
himself further discussion of Tethina. His mind still spun thinking
about her. Last night he had been so sure of his path, but his
father had thrown it all into doubt with a single phrase, “be her
friend.” He tried to think about how that would work. What would
they even talk about? How could he ever relate to someone like
her?

“
I had Elton dig Tethina’s
letters from my baggage if you would like to read them. I will also
tell you anything you want to know about her or her inheritance.
Once I finish this contract, I am yours for the rest of the
day.”

Rynn looked up in excitement, but his
expression turned to confusion with the mention of inheritance.
“Later,” Dasen told him. Uncharacteristically, he just shrugged and
returned to his toast and eggs.

Dasen wondered what had
happened to his father. He seemed like an entirely different person
this morning, engaged, respectful, forthcoming, pleasant.
Does he think those words last night will turn
around twelve years of neglect? That all will be forgiven and
somehow normal between us?

At least he’s
trying
, a voice sounded in his mind. Dasen
could not disagree. Maybe there was still time for a new start. His
thoughts turned to his plans from the previous night. In the light
of the day, they seemed petty. Could he really destroy his father’s
company? Even if it had taken his father away from him, was he
really capable of that much spite? Especially, if his father really
wanted a new start?

Cautiously, Dasen decided to see where
this would lead, if his father was really willing to back his words
with actions. “Thank you,” he replied. “I would like that. I have
spent so much time trying to construct Tethina in my mind. It will
be good to finally have something to build on.”

Ipid smiled and nodded, but there was
sadness behind it, disappointment maybe. “Eat your breakfast while
I finish this contract. It is almost done. We will have plenty of
time to talk during our journey.” Ipid returned to his notations.
Dasen speared a sausage but did not taste it for the anticipation
that rose inside him. Finally, he would learn something substantial
about Tethina, would get a full picture of the challenge he faced,
and could start planning to overcome it.

#

Three hours later, Dasen finished the
last of Tethina’s letters. There had been over a hundred of them.
It appeared that she had written Ipid almost monthly for the last
twelve years. Ipid had kept them in a book box made of heavily
polished walnut with a magnificently inlaid cherry-wood rose. The
older pages had yellowed with age, but the ink remained dark,
unsullied. The pages had been folded for delivery, but the creases
had been carefully pressed out so that the paper would not wear
along them. It was clear that Ipid treasured these letters. Some of
the earliest were little more than childish pictures with a few
poorly constructed and spelled words or phrases, but as they
progressed their length and detail also grew.

As Ipid had said, she had
a clear, strong hand and was an effective, if inelegant, writer.
Still, the letters did nothing to quell Dasen’s fears. If anything,
they had confirmed and expounded them. The letters made clear that
Tethina was a rebel. She had no friends in the village. The adults
chastised her, held her up as a poor example, or simply ignored
her. As a result, the other children bullied her with impunity.
They teased her, called her names, sought to humiliate her. And she
responded in the most overt and even violent ways. She had
(proudly) dealt out many a bruise, welt, even broken bone. The
worst assaults had resulted in days and days transcribing
The Book of Valatarian
for the local counselor, a man she clearly hated. And with
each altercation, each punishment, Tethina had retreated farther
and farther into herself and the forest she loved. As the letters
progressed, she wrote more and more about her hunting trips, the
game she had killed, the rare herbs she had gathered, the hidden
corners of the uninhabited forest she had explored, the days and
nights she had spent alone with the trees. Then came the district
games. She had prepared herself for them for months, had clearly
meant it as the penultimate thumb-to-the-nose for the villagers who
had made her life so miserable. Obviously, she had succeeded, but
had she really won?

Dasen sat back and put the final
letter onto the stack next to him. It was strange for the seat to
be empty, but Ipid had exiled Rynn to the driver’s bench when he
would not stop reading the letters over Dasen’s shoulder with a
series of gasps, snorts, and excoriating comments. His voice still
drifted into the box from the front where he was regaling the
driver, Esso, a boisterous man, whom Ipid had hired for this trip.
They seemed to be enjoying themselves as the guffaws were frequent
and loud. To be honest, Dasen was glad that his friend was not with
him. He needed time alone to think about it all, and Rynn’s running
commentary was not likely to be helpful.

He stared at the polished wood that
defined the roof of the coach, traced the patterns in the grain of
each board, watched the copper lamp bounce on its chain. He felt
the coach shaking beneath him. The road was obviously rough and not
improved by the days of rain, but the heavy springs that held each
wheel absorbed most of the bumps, and he had grown so used to the
feel of the road that he barely noticed it now. His eyes moved down
to the open window at his side. The heavy, satin curtain had been
roped back to allow in the air and sunlight. The benefit of the
rain was that there was no dust blowing in with the warm breeze.
The downside was that it made the hot air sticky and heavy. Dasen
had stripped off his vest and undone two of his shirt buttons, but
sweat soaked his head and his back was damp against the cushion
behind him.

Outside the window were trees. For
days now, nothing but trees so dense that he could not see more
than a few paces beyond the road. Having spent most of his life in
cities surrounded by vast plains, he had never conceived that a
forest could be this large or dense. The trees looked most like
great walls passing on either side of them. How had Tethina ever
managed to live in something like that? How could she even walk
through the tangle of branches?

“
So what do you think?”
Ipid asked, drawing Dasen from his thoughts. As he had promised, he
had not done any work that morning. He sat, watching Dasen, handing
him new letters when he finished each. He answered questions when
asked, but did not offer any other comments. Now he looked
decidedly uncertain, like he was trying to catch a mouse and was
not sure which way it would run.

Dasen thought about Tethina, realized
that what he felt most was sympathy. She had been allowed to follow
this impossible path, and no one had pulled her back. No one had
the courage to tell her no. Then it became a downward spiral. Her
denial of the Order made her a pariah in the village, which only
led her to rebel further. Now, he wondered if she could ever be
saved or if she was too far gone for even the Order to reclaim. And
that was what she clearly needed. As long as she defied the Order,
she would continue to create conflict in her community and herself.
Dasen could not think of a clearer example of why conformity to the
Order was so important, of what happened when individuals were
allowed to defy the Order. It only confirmed that what Tethina
needed most was someone to bring her back, to show her her proper
place. That is what a friend would do. “Why didn’t you ever stop
her?” he finally asked, feeling real disappointment in his father.
“You were her guardian. It was your role to provide her guidance in
the Order. It was your responsibility to keep this from
happening.”

Ipid flinched but, to Dasen’s
surprise, did not seem offended by the question. “What is it that
you think happened?”

“
She has obviously drifted
far from the Order. She has created a turmoil all around her. This
is exactly what counselors mean when they speak of the effects of
not following the Order. It hurts not only the individual but the
entire community, creates strife and discord. It should never have
been allowed to go this far.”

Ipid let out a long, slow breath. “I’m
sorry that you feel that way. I see things differently. I see a
girl who had lost everything. I see a forest that helped her heal
when nothing else could. It became the friend she needed, her safe
harbor.” Ipid paused and thought. “Certainly you are right that I
failed her. But in the same way I failed you, not in this. It was
not by allowing her to find and embrace the thing that could heal
her. If I had taken that away from her, you can be sure the outcome
would have been much worse.”

Dasen opened his mouth to respond.
What his father said may have been right in those first few months,
but to allow it to go on so long, to reach this point had been a
mistake. Now it would be up to him to fix what his father lacked
the courage to repair.

Ipid held up a hand to stop him. “Read
through the letters again,” he advised. “Pay attention to how she
speaks about the forest, about how it makes her feel. Listen to the
pride in her words when she talks about the buck she dropped with a
single arrow. Then tell me you could have taken that away from
her.” He paused, drew another deep breath. “I know this doesn’t fit
with what the counselors have taught you, but please consider that
the Order is more complex than we accept it to be, consider that
not everyone’s path is the same, that the differences may be good,
a part of the plan, part of what the Twins meant when they gave us
freewill.”

Dasen sat back. What his father had
just said bordered on sacrilege. Certainly during the reign of the
Empire, it would have been punishable by death. Even now, the
Church taught that freewill was not a gift. It was, if anything, a
curse endowed to humans by Hilaal to spite his brother. It was each
person’s duty to deny their freewill, to rely instead on the
ability that Hileil had given them to see the Order and find their
place in it. It was only the Exiles that placed their freewill
above the Order, and as legend said, doing so had nearly destroyed
the world.