Jadde - The Fragile Sanctuary (3 page)

     Malkrin fidgeted; how many more
examples would Sire Josiath give?

     ‘Mellkiln Cattail, a shepherd, could
stare down a mountain goat and have it eating from his hand. Suddenly he could
only do it occasionally – he was banished too.’

     ‘What do your examples amount to?’
Malkrin asked impatiently in case his elderly friend gave more examples.

     ‘That they always banish regardless of
whether the talent has been lost through age, illness, fraud, misuse, lost
confidence or simply anxiety.’

     ‘How does this affect me?’

     ‘I believe you are the last category.’

     Malkrin felt anger rise. ‘Are you
saying I’m worrying the highsense away Sire?’

     ‘You hinder it with the fear of the Brenna’s
bullying of failed talent. It handicapped your gift – because you knew you’d
held it longer than nearly all recent high-people. Subconsciously you presumed the
gift would soon fail.’

     ‘Then I must cast out sensitivity and
let it work its will without my pushing.’

     ‘I believe that would be best, my
friend.’

     ‘You guessed I have found the sense
flickering?’

     ‘I have.’

     ‘Then I thank Jadde you kept it to
yourself.’

     ‘Indeed. Be reassured, your talent is
great, better than any found in recent lifetimes.’ The priest gave the hand to
heart sign ‘Thanks to Jadde’. Then he stiffened in the fire’s shadows and whispered,
‘more than any that have been acknowledged.’

     Malkrin raised his eyebrows
involuntarily, ‘Have others had highsenses unacknowledged?’ He paused and focused
on the disclosure, ‘have folk deliberately kept themselves unannounced?’

     ‘I believe so, but do not repeat it. No
one has ever undergone Jadde’s trial charged with concealment. I have read
deeply of the scriptures and found no past mention of how to reveal
deliberately hidden gifts.’

     Malkrin envisaged men and women intentionally
suppressing their highsense in order that they stay forever within the tribe
without the risk of banishment. People so fearful of the Brenna’s
interpretation of Jadde’s law they’d rather deny it. But surely a talent would
shine through with its inherent extraordinariness? He thanked his mentor for
the insight. ‘I must seek out these others and bond them, so we can teach each
other.’ Then he thought, so they can help me throw off the Brenna’s brutality.

     Josiath waved dismissively, ‘as I say,
none with intermittent talent have ever admitted their gift. What makes you think
you can spot them so easily?’ He raised his hand as Malkrin sought to
interrupt. ‘The priesthood keeps a close eye on the Brenna and the ordinary
folk, and as I say, none have been found. They hide it cleverly.’

     ‘It is indeed an interesting insight, something
that I will keep a constant watch for.’ Malkrin was pleased at being taken into
the priest’s confidence. Then he wondered why Josiath had decided to mention it
now – was he preparing him to cope with future disgrace and banishment? Or was
he hoping Malkrin could organise opposition against the Brenna?

     After a meal of bread, venison and
honey-beer he took leave of the priest and made his way back to his and
Cabryce’s cottage. He strode along the familiar winding lane past townsfolk’s
hovels and huts. Deep in thought he arrived at his substantial timber framed home
with its stone infill and roof of packed marsh reed. He slammed the door in an
attempt to leave the unanswerable questions and the tribe’s expectations
outside.

Cabryce had cooked his favourite meal of stew.
He thanked her knowing she was trying to bolster his spirits against the loss
of his prestige.

     Later as they lay on their duck
feather mattress discussing the day’s tribulations, he made a decision to act
on a long prepared scheme. After all if his highsense flickered badly again the
outcome was obvious and he had nothing to lose.

CHAPTER THREE

I
t had long been said that Jadde had left
the Seconchane a great treasure. However the scriptures ignored the tale and
the priests shook their heads in denial when asked. But folklore told of a
great prize hidden somewhere in Cyprusnia and that when the Seconchane were worthy
it would allow itself to be found.

The legend had always intrigued Malkrin for
he had knowledge of Jadde’s scriptures from Sire Josiath’s teachings. But his
mentor had always been elusive when Malkrin mentioned the subject. Malkrin had often
attempted to question him further. Josiath had always mumbled, ‘wishful thinking,’
and moved to more weighty matters. His tutor’s refusal to discuss the subject
allowed the young Malkrin’s imagination to run wild. So he had eventually surmised
that Jadde’s treasure waited to benefit the one person who fulfilled her
greatest requirement – that of gaining the highest of highsense. He really
hoped that he would be able to achieve this perfection, then after sufficient
honing and practice he could reveal the treasure. He would use it and his new
skills to help the people of Cyprusnia. He would arrange for them all to have better
homes. He’d clothe them in the same luxurious garments the Brenna wore and
perhaps have the priests teach them to read the scriptures. If enough treasure
was left he could then even bribe the priests to copy Jadde’s great texts and
distribute them to the now knowledgeable citizens.

Before his highsense failed, he needed to
discover what truth lay in the fable. He thought the best way of succeeding
would be to apply his unique abilities to the search.

 As he walked through the town he tried to
increase the power of his hunter instincts, to trick the treasure into
revealing itself. After many failed attempts he clenched his fists in frustration
and fervently wished he could develop the talent Jadde had gifted him. Perhaps
the treasure could not hear his request. He needed to be nearer its location,
so walked further from Edentown, focusing the energy from his inner ear and
attempting to change it to sending a request. After many days of failure he decided
the solution was not to be found this way. He vowed to start anew.

Three sunsets later Malkrin sat watching
chickens pecking at seed in his backyard and thinking idly of Josiath’s tales
of lost gifts. Having forfeited a highsense sun and being partially disgraced fermented
his determination to create the highsense like bubbles increasing in a pot of
heating water.

He mulled over his existing gifts.
Enhancing them hadn’t worked.  Should he attempt to create a new highsense? One
specifically created to hunt for the great prize.

 Then a sudden flash of inspiration – develop
an inner sight to compliment his powerful highsense hearing. Use it to look
through walls, beneath the ground or within hidden spaces – the very places where
the treasure might be concealed. So he began to focus and channel the flow whenever
he felt his gift strong. But after days of hard concentration, nothing
developed. His frustration led to increased determination and he practised even
harder in spare time between hunts.

He persevered, and a wisp of something
formed in his mind like distant shapes in a winter fog. He channelled the inner
energy along this new path creating more connections to his eyes and mind.
Gradually foggy shapes sharpened as he learnt to focus them. At first it was a
strange experience. The inside of a log was full of burrowing, whispering
insects. The space between buried rocks teamed with dark snakes that slithered
and hissed. The inside of sheep and cats were a vivid red that gurgled and pounded.

Now ecstatic with success he had to keep
his attempts secret – the Brenna Council would have expected permanency. If the
new highsense disappeared then at best he would look a fool, at worst his other
highsense sun would be forfeit. He would be rightfully outcast. He kept his blossoming
ability from Josiath as well. In case the mere mention of his fresh talent
would wither it, causing his mentor to lose faith in him.

Over the following weeks he sent his new
inner eye into places that were previously inaccessible. But peering into voids
in walls or secluded holes between buildings revealed nothing. He tested under the
floors of hovels, huts and barns then under woodland clearings, but still nowhere
revealed the hidden prize.

Then one day he viewed the familiar outline
of the ancient Priests Keep above the people’s homes and wondered why he hadn’t
searched nearer the massive structure. With a tingling anticipation he could
think of no more obvious place for the treasure to be hidden. Labyrinthine
tunnels were rumoured to lie beneath the holy mount. Using his new inner-sight
he decided to see if they really existed. Then if they were there he could see
through to where the great treasure resided.

He walked up the cherry and plum tree lined
track and then around the hill to the stone walls of the keep.  At intervals priests
stopped him. Had he been ‘ordinary folk’ he would have been turned back but his
highsense sun meant they waved him on.  He pretended to examine the fruit trees
as he wound his way up the priest-walk. Then with frequent pauses to look
downhill at the smoking chimneys and reed roofs of Edentown, he strolled around
the base of the towering walls. Outwardly he was taking a relaxing stroll but
inwardly he gathered his inner sight and hurled it beneath his feet.

There were plenty of small cavities shaped
by draining water through aeons of time. Other gaps were full of cobwebs and
spiders. His inner eye crept closer to the walls then darted through the solid foundations.

And beneath this huge building his internal
eye bounced from a wall of black – a complete absence of –
anything
. His
mind reeled as if struck by a hunters club. His legs faltered and he stumbled. Somehow
the priests had shielded his view. The treasure must be secretly stored there
and they were guarding it with an unknown magic.

Or maybe they knew nothing of it.

With a hammer blow thought, his head felt
about to shatter. What if it was not the priesthood that had banned him but . .
.

Then in a sudden full sweat he realised he may
have invaded Jadde’s’ privacy and that the Goddess herself had created a vast
nothingness to hide the treasure – or herself.

Had he just offended her?  

He reeled from the revelation.

His heart pounded and he staggered in alarm
. . . could it have been the Goddess who had barred his vision? Or maybe the
treasure was not there at all and something else lurked there, something evil.
His mind spun as possibilities assaulted him and he drew huge breaths as if
he’d spent a day running down a stag.

What else could be there?

And things that inhabit childhood
nightmares filled his mind.

Were the holy men in league with an unknown
evil that could tell he had probed their most secret sanctum? His new highsense
froze in alarm. His body became unresponsive. He stood in passive resignation
for a crowd of angry priests, or a dark vengeful unknown to come for him. They,
or it, would torture him in a macabre chamber deep in the black nothingness.

Scenes of other agonising punishments rose
then overflowed.

The track back to Edentown seemed endless.
And then he didn’t sleep for four nights worrying about what may befall him. Had
he offended the Goddess, or was he about to suffer gruesome torture by the
unknown that hid behind the black nothing?

He had four lacklustre hunts during the
daylight hours. No one blamed him. How could they; the game did not appear to
be there.

 No knock came on his door. No priest or Brenna
came to drag him into the dark space under the keep. The Brenna Council failed
to summon him for banishment. Even Josiath did not ask awkward questions. He
proclaimed himself sick and unable to lead any more hunts that week.

Another week passed; then two more. Gradually
he went about the hunt and his chores as normal. He began to relax and Cabryce
sensing this relaxed too, although she had had no idea what had ailed him.

He was too afraid to use his new found
ability during those terrible weeks of turmoil.

After a time he gently began testing it by
looking into small spaces wherever he happened to be. No retribution descended
on him, so he turned his attention to the Great Hall and Jadde’s mysterious
altar. Could it contain the treasure, guarded by the Goddess and under the
tribe’s eyes all along? After being so close to the imposing stone during his
trial he remembered the strange tingling that had touched his highsense. Not uncomfortable
or probing, it had merely brushed like a feather and disappeared back into the
great artefact.

He mulled over what her altar might contain
and how the wondrous stories of its magic could be embodied and created within
it. He even pondered on whether Jadde herself actually dwelt within the stone just
like the priests taught. Did her glowing presence really fill the heart of the carved
stone? He dismissed that idea; it was the equivalent of thinking the Goddess
caged. Perhaps it was solid stone and his inner eye would just follow its
meandering fault-lines. He just hoped the altar did not contain any
unfathomable darkness.

     There was only one thing to do. He had
to get near enough to the sacred altar to use his inner eye. And that meant
sneaking in past the Brenna guards at the Gates of Justice leading to the Great
Hall.

     Cabryce was often his confidant but he
didn’t want to involve her. The less she knew the better, should the Brenna
guards discover him and come for her as well.

     Malkrin began by loitering around the
walls of the Great Hall browsing the market that had always traded there. He
pretended to examine the wares, all the time keeping a close eye on the gate-guards
and using his highsense ear to listen to their conversations. He risked asking a
stall-keeper a casual question, and found the guards changed every third
hourglass. After three visits to the market he noticed times when the guards
were lax. For a large number of breaths the huge oak doors were left unguarded.
This especially happened when an overweight gatekeeper was the next on duty. Malkrin
continued to wander the market every evening and began to accumulate trinkets
and effigies of Jadde as he sought to define the sentry routine. He was
particularly pleased when highsensing a conversation between two guards. They
had just bartered cloth for food from a stall-keeper.

     ‘One more duty and I can take two days
to be with me children. I hate guarding this place.’

     ‘You’d miss leering at the stalls-women
if you asked for other duties.’

     ‘I’d rather guard inside Jadde’s
Hall.’

     ‘No you wouldn’t, it’s so quiet in
there you’d fall asleep. Just Thank Jadde no one has ever had duty inside that
ghost filled place.’

The guards had quickly retired to the
warmth of the barracks.

     Finally Malkrin decided the fat guard’s
duty would offer the best opportunity for him to sneak by. This sentry had the
evening watch for the next four days. By the look of the gathering rainclouds
the man would be particularly liable to take cover that evening. He bought a
last figurine, wished the stall-keeper a prosperous season then left to prepare
for his intrusion.

He asked Nardin Fleetfoot to cover for his
absence when he called round to Malkrin’s home later. He was still keen to
repay a debt to Malkrin. Last year Malkrin had highsensed Nardin’s daughter
Rawan choking after falling into the river. He had raised the alarm and run.  She
had been clutching bulrush stems and only seconds remained before she would
have been swept away. He had just reached her in time. Then he had brushed her father’s
gratitude aside. Nardin was a good friend and ally, he and Cabryce had known
him since childhood.

Later he was ready, grabbed his cloak, made
an excuse to Cabryce and left.

     Malkrin waited in the overhanging
shadows of a grass roof opposite the Great Hall. It was late evening and the clouds
were now emptying lashing rain on the township. A tall haggard guard strode
restlessly, eying the approaching storm. On cue the deluge worsened and the gate-guard
sloped off. Malkrin estimated the fat one would not appear for thirty breaths.
He slid along the wall toward the arched gate shielded by the night and sheets
of splashing rain. Beyond was the hall. He kept his inner ear focused on the barracks
door. It opened with a dull creak and a large figure blocked the lamplight then
reluctantly strolled out. The figure paused to look longingly back into the
warmth.

Malkrin dived under the arch then through
the shadowed courtyard and along the right angled wall. He reached the
overhanging stonework of the hall as the fat shape plodded head down. It finally
reached the thatched walkway that led to the gate arch then the sentry position
under the vaulted stonework. Water streamed from the gatehouse roof like a
waterfall, restricting the fat guard’s view.

Malkrin ran along the Great Hall’s outer wall.
Its thatched overhang sheltered him from the downpour. He reached the engraved
oak door, opened it soundlessly and slipped inside.