The Myst Reader (61 page)

Lord Eneah had been gravely ill, and his voice now as he spoke seemed fatigued; yet there was still a strength behind it.

“We have heard the arguments, Guildsmen, and many among you will have already decided what you think. Yet this is a grave matter, and before we take the irrevocable step of a vote, I feel there should be the opportunity for a more
informal
debate of the matters raised. We shall come to a vote in an hour, but first we shall adjourn this sitting and retire to the vestibule.”

If some were disappointed by this, they did not show it, while others nodded, as if the decision were wisdom itself. The D’ni were a patient race, after all, and many matters that might have been decided “hastily” in the chamber had been resolved in the more informal atmosphere of the vestibule.

The remaining Lords rose to their feet and made their way out, followed a moment later by the other members of the great Council.

If the great chamber had been all solemnity and dignity, the vestibule was buzzing with talk, as members went from group to group, attempting to persuade others to their cause.

Rarely in recent years had a single issue raised so much heat and passion, and now that a vote was but an hour off, both camps made great efforts to win last-minute converts to their causes.

Aitrus, who had drifted into the vestibule alone, stood beneath the great arch a moment, looking across to where Veovis stood beside Lord Eneah, who sat in a chair that had been brought out especially for him. Veovis was addressing a small crowd of elder members, undaunted by the fact that many there were a century or two older than he. Such confidence impressed Aitrus, and he knew for certain that Veovis would one day sit where Lord Eneah had sat today, in the central throne.

It was not the right time, not just now, when Veovis was among such company, yet he would have to speak to him, to tell him of his change of mind, before they returned to the great chamber.

Aitrus made his way across, smiling and greeting other guildsmen as he went. Yet he was barely halfway across when he noticed a disturbance on the far side of the vestibule.

He craned his neck, trying to see. The door guards were arguing with someone. Then, abruptly, it seemed, they stood back, allowing the newcomer to pass. It was a senior guildsman from the Guild of Messengers. In one hand he clutched a sealed letter.

As the Council members began to realize that there was an intruder among them, the noise in the vestibule slowly died. Heads turned. Guildsmen turned to face the newcomer as he made his way between them, heading directly to where Lord Eneah sat.

The vestibule and chamber were normally sacrosanct. To permit a Messenger to enter while they were in session was almost unheard of. This had to be a matter of the greatest urgency.

By the time the Messenger stepped out before Lord Eneah, a complete silence had fallen over the vestibule. Kneeling, the man bowed his head and held the letter out.

At a gesture from Lord Eneah, Veovis took the letter and, breaking the seal, handed it to the elder. Eneah slowly unfolded the single sheet, then, lifting his chin and peering at it, began to read. After a moment he looked up, a faint bemusement in his eyes.

“Guildsmen,” he said, “it appears the decision has been made for us. We have a visitor. An outsider from the surface.”

There was a moment’s stunned silence, followed by a sudden uproar in the chamber.

F
OR THE REST OF THAT DAY THE HIGH-COUNCIL
—the five Great Lords and the eighteen Grand Masters—sat in special session to decide what should be done.

While they were meeting, rumors swept the great city in the cavern. Many concerned the
nature
of the intruder, speculating upon what manner of creature had been taken by the Maintainers. While most agreed that it was humanoid in form, some claimed it was a cross between a bear and an ape. Other rumors were wilder yet. One such tale had it that a whole tribe of outsiders—heavily armed savages, intent on trouble—had come far down the tunnels, trying to force entry into D’ni, and that it had taken the whole garrison of Maintainers, backed up by the City Guard, to fight them off.

Such “news,” Aitrus was certain, was completely unfounded, yet in the absence of hard fact even he found himself caught up in the games of speculation—so much so, that as evening fell and the lake waters dimmed, he left his rooms and set out through the narrow alleyways of the upper town, intending to visit the Hall of the Guild of Writers where his friend Veovis dwelt.

If anyone outside that central group of Lords and Masters knew what was happening, Veovis would.

Arriving at the gate of the ancient hall, Aitrus waited in the tiny courtyard before the main doors while a steward was sent to notify Veovis of his presence.

Several minutes passed, and then the steward returned.

Aitrus followed him through, between high, fluted pillars and along a broad mosaic path that bisected Ri’Neref’s Hall, the first of five great halls named after the greatest of the guild’s sons. Like most of the ancient Guild Halls, the Hall of the Guild of Writers was not a single building but a complex of interlinked buildings and rooms, some of them cut deep into the face of the great cavern. As Aitrus ventured farther into the complex, he climbed up narrow flights of ancient steps, the stone of which seemed almost to have been melted over time, like wax, eroded by the passage of countless feet over the six millennia of D’ni’s existence.

Here, in this great sprawl of ancient stone, two thousand guildsmen lived and ate and slept. Here they were educated, here went about the simple daily business of the guild. Here also were the book rooms and great libraries of the guild, the like of which could be found nowhere else in D’ni.

Walking through its ancient hallways, Aitrus felt the huge weight of history that lay behind the Writers Guild. Though the Writers claimed no special privileges, nor had a greater voice than any other on the Council, it was held to be the most prestigious of the Eighteen, and its members had a sense of that.

To be a Writer, that was the dream of many a D’ni boy.

The steward slowed, then stopped before a door. Turning to Aitrus, he bowed again. “We are here, Master.”

Aitrus waited while the steward knocked.

A voice, Veovis’s, called from within. “Enter!”

The steward pushed the door open a little and looked inside. “Forgive me, Guild Master, but it is Master Aitrus, from the Guild of Surveyors.”

“Show him in.”

As the steward pushed the door back, Aitrus stepped forward. Veovis was in his chair on the far side of the big, low-ceilinged study. Books filled the walls on every side. A portrait of Rakeri, Veovis’s father, hung on the wall behind a huge oak-topped desk. In tall-backed chairs close by sat two other men—one old, one young. The elder Aitrus recognized as Lianis, Veovis’s tutor and chief adviser, the younger was Suahrnir, Veovis’s Maintainer friend.

“Ah, Aitrus,” Veovis said, getting up, a broad smile lighting his features. “Welcome, dear friend.”

Aitrus heard the door close quietly behind him. “Forgive me for intruding, Veovis, but I wondered if you had any news.”

Veovis came over and took his hands, then, stepping back, gestured toward the chair beside his own. “It is curious that you should arrive just at this moment. Suahrnir has just come from the Guild House. It seems the High Council has finished deliberating. A notice is to be posted throughout the city within the hour.”

“So what
is
the news?”

Veovis sat. The smile had gone from his face. “There are to be special Hearings, before the Council.”

Aitrus sat, looking to his friend. “Hearings? What kind of Hearings?”

Veovis shrugged. “All I know so far is that the outsider is to be interrogated, and that we, as Council members, will be allowed to witness the interrogation. My assumption is that the questions will have to do with the nature of life on the surface.”

“He speaks D’ni?”

“Not a word. And it is not a he, Aitrus. The outsider is a female.”

Aitrus blinked with surprise. “A woman?”

“A girl. A young girl, so I am told, barely out of infancy.”

Aitrus shook his head. It was difficult to believe that anyone, let alone a young girl, could have made her way down from the surface. He frowned. “But if she speaks no D’ni, then how are we to question her?”

“Who can say?” Veovis answered, the slightest hint of irony in his voice. “But it appears she is to be handed over to the Guild of Linguists. They are to try to make sense of her strange utterances. That is the idea, anyway. Personally, I would be surprised if she does more than grunt for her food when she wants it.”

“You think so?”

“Oh, I am quite certain of it, Aitrus. Word is that she is a rather large-boned animal, and totally covered in hair.”

“In
hair
?”

Veovis nodded. “But I guess that, too, is to be expected, no? After all, one would need some kind of special covering to protect the body against the elements, wouldn’t one?”

“I suppose so.”

“And besides, some creatures find that
attractive
, or so I am told.”

There was laughter, but Aitrus was silent, wondering just what circumstances would force a young girl—whatever her species—to venture down the tunnels. It was not, after all, what one would expect.

“Is there any way I could see her?” Aitrus asked.

“I doubt it,” Veovis answered. “Word is she is being kept on an island in the cavern of Irrat. The Linguists will have her locked away for months, no doubt. You know how
thorough
they are!”

“Besides,” Veovis went on, “it is unlikely any of us will get a glimpse of her before the Hearings. If what Suahrnir says is true, almost half of the High Council were in favor of shipping her out to a Prison Age straight away, and having done with the matter. Only Lord Eneah’s personal intervention prevented such a course.”

“But she’s only a girl.”

“Sentiment, Aitrus,” Suahrnir chipped in. “Pure sentiment. A girl she may be, but she is not D’ni. We cannot attribute her with the same intelligence or sensitivity we D’ni possess. And as for her being
only
a girl, you cannot argue that. Her mere existence here in D’ni has thrown the people into turmoil. They talk of nothing else. Nor will they until this matter is resolved. No. Her arrival here is a bad thing. It will unsettle the common people.”

Aitrus was amazed by Suahrnir’s vehemence. “Do you really think so, Suahrnir?”

“Suahrnir is right, Aitrus,” Veovis said quietly. “We might joke about it, but this issue is a serious one, and had my own opinion been sought, I, too, would have advocated placing her somewhere where she can trouble the public imagination as little as possible.”

Aitrus sighed. “I hear what you are saying. Maybe it
will
unsettle people. Yet it would be a great shame, surely, if we did not attempt to discover all we can about conditions up there on the surface?”

“We know now that it is inhabited. Is that not enough?”

Aitrus looked down. He did not want to be drawn into an argument with his friend over this issue.

“Still,” Veovis added, when he did not answer, “the matter is out of our hands, eh, old friend? The High Council have decreed that there shall be Hearings and so there shall, whether I will it or no. Let us pray, then, that the Linguists—good men though they are—fail to make sense of the creature this one time.”

Aitrus glanced up and saw that Veovis was smiling teasingly. Slowly that smile faded. “Nothing but trouble can come of this, Aitrus, I warrant you.
Nothing
but trouble.”

GUILD MASTER HAEMIS LOCKED THE DOOR TO
the cell, then turned, facing his pupil. She sat there behind the narrow desk, quiet and attentive, the light blue robe they had put her in making her seem more like a young acolyte than a prisoner.

“And how are you, this morning, Ah-na?”

“I am well, Master Haemis,” she answered, the slight harshness in her pronunciation still there, but much less noticeable than it had been.

“Thoe kenem, Nava,” she said. How are you, Master?

Haemis smiled, pleased with her. They had begun by trying simply to translate her native speech, to find D’ni equivalents for everyday objects and simple actions, but to his surprise she had begun to turn the tables on them, pointing to objects and, by means of facial gesture, coaxing him to name them. The quickness of her mind had astonished them all. By the eighth week she had been speaking basic D’ni phrases. It was baby-talk, true, but still quite remarkable, considering where she came from.

Twenty weeks on and she was almost fluent. Each day she extended her vocabulary, pushing them to teach her all they knew.

“Is it just you today, Master Haemis?”

Haemis sat, facing her. “Grand Master Gihran will be joining us later, Ah-na. But for the first hour it is just you and I.” He smiled. “So? What shall we do today?”