The Verse:
His heart in silence and singing,
His heart planted in the earth, planted in her.
The Vision:
The vision is of Jamey in the refugee camp at Albion Port-of-Call. He’s singing to himself as he tends a garden.
Commentary by Archbishop Co’oal Venesti:
Even before he assumed the role of Archon, Ashtara proved himself to be worthy: heroic, humble, and the personification of n’aashet n’aaverti.
Commentary by Elma, High Prophetess of Skarsia:
Ashtara, you are so strange. Why would you emanate such a creature?
Commentary by Her Eminence Tara del D’myn, 6th Matriarch of Skarsia:
Another vision of the past although this one took place under the influence of the blue amrita. It was immediately clear to me what I was seeing. In retrospect, it’s strange that I never thought to ask Jamey about it before. But then again, it seems somehow inappropriate to ask Jamey anything.
Another peculiar thing is that the part of the story I knew and recognized has never been told, and only alluded to in the briefest of fashions in Ash’s novel. It is the tale of my first meeting with Jamey, and why I promised him a knighthood.
Perhaps it makes the most sense to tell the story from the beginning. But then to switch from his point-of-view to mine in mid-story is awkward. And I think Jamey feels uncomfortable in even having a point-of-view. Therefore, I’ve asked Patrick to step in and write this in a narrative form.
Commentary by His Highness Prince Patrick Fitzroy:
He’s standing alone on the strand. There’s nothing but pain. He wraps his skinny arms around himself and shivers. It’s the first chill of Sunslip. Novemberoon will soon be here. Usually it’s not very chill, even in Novemberoon. The weather on Dolparessa is always beautiful.
The weather on Dolparessa is not beautiful. It’s too dry, for one. He doesn’t know it yet, but there will be snow that year. There will be snow for the first time since…since the Arya made their pact with the 4th Matriarch, allowing them to focus and amplify their power. Allowing the Archon to control the weather.
The Archon is dying, and he feels this in his bones. He ought to tell someone. That’s a little difficult because he can’t speak. He tries his voice. Nothing. He tries to laugh, to scream. Nothing.
He tries to sing. His voice is beautiful.
He wanders down the beach, singing his pain. There’s something he needs to do, but that would mean looking over his shoulder, and he doesn’t want to do that. Vaguely, he remembers a legend about a woman who did and turned into salt. More vividly, he remembers a myth about a man who did and lost his love forever.
His love. To lose his love would be to lose himself. Himself.
He looks.
He would’ve screamed if he had a voice. I and I had been coiled up in the roots and branches for so long, none of them had any idea what the tree looked like. It wasn’t good. The mountain had fallen on it. Patches of bark were bruised or missing entirely. The trauma had caused it to drop all of its leaves, and now there were only a few sickly soldiers, testing their strength, greedily grabbing the sunlight.
It was supported by an enormous and ungainly scaffolding. Tara had hoisted it back up again, rebuilt the mountain, and grafted Tommy back on.
Tommy. He winces. He remembers the sound of it, the sickening snap as the tree lurched forward, clinging by the roots as the mountain slid. The branch tumbled to the beach while the tree hung dangling.
I’m okay, says a weak voice. I had a bad spot, but Tara saved me.
You need the mirror, says a stronger voice. It’s Jack.
He doesn’t want to walk back up there. The soil hasn’t settled, and he feels self-conscious about his own scraggly branch. But there’s a tide pool. He looks.
The reflection is there. He’s so thin. His hair is matted, hanging almost to his shoulders, hanging into his eyes. He can’t quite make out his hair color; it looks dingy in the shallow pool. But his eyes are blue. That’s no surprise.
It’s traditional to say the name aloud when they know it. But he can’t. Instead he finds a piece of driftwood and writes in the sand: Jamey Maonach. James, the supplanter. Maonach means silent. So he knows now what burden his branch is meant to carry.
There are vague pieces of the Cantor’s instruction floating in his head, but they don’t make sense. It’s so hard to hear the others over his pain, and there are so many of them now. Too many? Really, he has no idea what too many will mean. But for now, he’s the ninth. That’s one more than the largest Cu’enashti on Dolparessa – well, the second-largest now. It’s becoming chaotic. Fragmented.
He can’t focus on them all. He can’t focus at all. He has to find focus.
He has to find Tara.
*****
He wanders into Merenis Port-of-Call before he realizes that 1) Daniel hasn’t had an apartment here in over two decades and 2) He looks insane, bedraggled, like a refugee.
Fortunately for him, it’s in the Zeitgeist. Merenis has become a refugee camp. It’s full of people who are fleeing from the army of Guinnebar the Pretender. Guinnebar had been making trouble for years, but no one paid any attention until the Great Reveal. Suddenly she was swamped with supporters who echoed her newly discovered xenophobia. They were burning the forests, burning out families with Cu’enashti members. Not many Cu’enashti had disclosed at this point. They were too afraid of rejection. But Guinnebar gave them a real reason to be afraid.
Not that disclosure mattered. Guinnebar had a method: torture. Cu’endhari could only take so much before reverting to their nul-energy forms. It was an agonizing forced revelation. And if a few – or a lot – of humans were tortured unnecessarily, oh well. Times were hard. There was only one safety, one proof of being a true human.
Brown eyes.
The particular shades of green and blue that the Cu’endhari possessed were actually quite easy to recognize, if one knew what to look for. At this stage, Guinnebar wasn’t being so fussy. So a lot of people were fleeing. The amount of refugees is too large for a small port like Merenis to support. So Jamey finds himself crossing the bridge over the Longtongue, relocated to the larger town of Albion-Port-of-Call.
He fits in. Like Daniel, he has a natural sweetness that draws people to him. Nobody questions why he doesn’t have a voice. Enough of them have seen too much, and it makes them wake in the night screaming. His silence is welcome, especially since he can work. His reedy form is surprisingly strong. He helps with the fishing, but soon they realize that he has extraordinary skills in working the soil.
They are surprised to hear him singing, though.
And then one day, something amazing happens. It’s early in Novemberoon, and Guinnebar is getting more and more aggressive. But finally – finally! The Empress has deigned to visit the camps. She’s a strange one – everyone thinks she’s strange. She’d buried herself in some ridiculous research lab for months. Whoever heard of an aristocrat who did research? But then when CenGov attacked, she was at the front line. Her true mettle came out: she was the daughter of the Terror of Nightside-Elsinore. The media push was filled with footage of her killing Cybrid soldiers.
And then she had made the Great Reveal, and turned life on end.
Some of the people here resented her for that, but most of those had gone over to Guinnebar. Most of the people in the camp were traditionalists. They were people who listened to the truth about the nau’gsh and said, ah, maybe we knew that already, in our bones and blood if not in our minds. They were people who loved her because she was the daughter of the probably murdered Chulain, direct descendant of Ernst Sider, loved her despite her mother the Skarsian battlequeen.
She comes to see the refugee camp, and it’s clear to everyone that she’s moved. She hadn’t realized how bad it was getting.
Jamey sees her, and then she’s all he sees. Despite the pain, he finds focus.
That evening, he sings for her. His friends in the camp explain that he doesn’t speak because he’s traumatized, and maybe it’s better if he doesn’t. It’s close enough to the truth.
Tara knows what he is. She’s smarter than Guinnebar; she knows what kind of eyes he has. She’s smarter than Guinnebar, but not smart enough because she knows what he is, but not who he is.
It would be easy for Tara to go home to the safety of her palace at Court Emmere, luxurious even though it had been shelled by the Terrans. She has a bedroom and a bath, but her precious garden has been blown to smithereens. Amazingly, the effigy of Lord Redmond remained; it was only the carelessness of a workman which would shatter it – along with every illusion she’s ever had, but that’s another story.
She doesn’t go home. She stays the evening, eating their simple fare and talking with the people. They love her. Especially Jamey, who can’t take his blue eyes away from her. Jamey won’t even close them tonight, pretending to sleep. He always pretends to sleep. He’s noticed that some of the Cu’endhari have stopped pretending.
Maybe not everyone loves her, because in the middle of the night, there’s a man with a knife.
Jamey sees it coming, but not with his eyes. The mothman sees it, thirty seconds into the future. Before the man can draw his blade, Jamey is across the camp and into the tent. It’s the assailant who yells as Jamey grabs his hand, wrestling him to the ground. Jamey is surprisingly strong. The man knees him in the groin. Jamey doubles over, but his work is done. Tara has a gun; Tara kills the assassin.
“When things are more settled, come to Court Emmere,” she says. “You’re my hero. I’ll make you my knight.”