Quest (2 page)

As she entered the enclosure, it seemed to seal around her like a trap, and she shuddered as she took her place in the circle of offrants and bowed her head. A semi-circle of girls faced a semi-circle of boys. Katia was oblivious to the encouraging smile from the Elder who had led the procession and the friendly nod of the girl next to her. In fact, she was oblivious now to everything except the terror churning within her.

When all was ready within the enclosure, the Sisters began to dance their way across the green, their complex steps at one with the rhythm which wove in and out of the melody like a live thing. The glittering figures paused in front of the enclosure and the music changed its beat. Four hundred adults began as one to sing the Great Chorus of Choosing.

The music seemed to pluck at Katia’s nerves as if she were a stringed instrument. Its rhythm was strange, hypnotic, repeating the archaic cadences until they controlled her very heart beat. This chorus was never performed at any other time, and never rehearsed. It was only sung by those who had already been offered to the God. No one, save those who had heard it through the mind-enhancing haze of festival wine, could remember its complexities.

And today it felt to be vibrating into Katia’s very bones.

The chorus stopped abruptly. Katia swallowed hard and stared at the ground as she waited in numb misery for something dreadful to happen.

The Sisters stood for several interminable minutes at the gates of the low enclosure, then one called out in a voice which blared in Katia’s ears like a trumpet call, ‘
Brother, look down upon us!
’

This call was again echoed by every spectator. ‘Look down! Look down upon us all!’

If she could have moved, Katia would have fled, in spite of her grandfather, but she couldn’t even twitch a muscle.

Both Sisters clapped their hands in unison and an intense silence fell upon the crowd, a silence which seemed much louder than the singing, and which still echoed the rhythms of the song. The Town Elder left the enclosure to stand outside its entrance. Then, and then only, did the taller Sister begin.

Walking slowly round the circle, she paused in front of each offrant, gazing deeply into eyes glazed with tension, weariness and festival wine. Each time she closed her own eyes for a moment to allow the God her Brother to speak within her. When he didn’t whisper in her ear, she reopened her eyes and nodded in dismissal. At this, each new adult took a step backwards, not knowing whether to be relieved or sorry not to have been claimed by the God.

Once, halfway round the circle, the Sister spoke. ‘I
name
you, Steflin. One day you shall be Elder of this community.’

The young man beamed with pride and remained where he was. In the crowd outside, his family’s faces reflected his pride and joy, but the silence still held.

The slow walk continued. To Katia, time itself seemed to pause and curl in on itself, as if waiting for this part of the ceremony to finish before it could start rushing on again. Nearer and nearer the Sister came, and still there was no hand outstretched to signify that the God had
chosen
one of the offrants to join his Sisterhood. It had been many years since a young woman from Danak had been called, and some of the townsfolk were saying that they had strayed from the God’s path and must live more strictly in future.

The glittering robe stopped in front of Katia. She looked up obediently into the eyes behind the mask and gasped aloud. It seemed as if she was falling into a dark tunnel, as if a thousand lights were exploding inside her mind. To
QUEST Shannah Jay 6

her horror, she saw a hand stretch out to rest on her head.

‘You are
chosen
by our Brother, dear child,’ intoned a melodious voice. ‘Welcome to the Sisterhood, Katia!’

Katia could only stand and stare into two implacable eyes while waves of terror washed through her. She heard her own voice say haltingly, ‘I shall serve our Brother with joy all the days of my life,’ even as her mind rejected the words and her spirit screamed for release.

She could do nothing but turn and follow one who was henceforth her Sister in God.

A murmur of surprise ran through the crowd as the Sister led Katia out of the enclosure, followed by Steflin.

Who would ever have expected the wild grandchild of Kensin the Verderer to be
chosen
by the God? However, a shout of joy erupted spontaneously from them as they realised what this meant. Once again, Danak had been found worthy. They burst into the Song of Rejoicing.

Katia stood motionless in front of the Meeting House while the joyful music beat around her aching head. The Sister must have done something to her, because she had only enough freedom of movement to swivel her eyes around desperately, searching for her grandfather. When she found him, she saw grief warring with pride in his face and she cried out mutely for him to come and rescue her, but he shook his head and stepped backwards.

One of the Sisters looked round quickly, ready to place another Compulsion upon this wayward and ungrateful young woman if she did anything to disrupt the rest of the ceremony.

But Katia had come to her senses. The thought of her grandfather’s humiliation if she brought shame upon the way he had raised her stiffened her spine, as did the years of training in the ways of the God. It was beyond imagining that anyone could ever want to refuse this, the greatest of honours. Katia’s lips curved into a parody of a smile.

The Sister guided her towards the wagon. There were some frowns when it was seen that Katia was not dancing the ritual steps, merely stumbling along between the Sisters. Children continued to throw their flowers at her feet and adults called out, ‘Remember Danak in your prayers.’

Someone helped her up into the wagon and a soft voice indicated where she should stand and told her to wave until they were out of sight of the townsfolk. She still couldn’t move freely and her vision was blurred with tears.

‘They are doubly blessed who do not have the conceit to aspire to our Brother’s service,’ said one of the Sisters loudly, and the townsfolk nearest nodded to one another as they repeated the words ‘doubly blessed’.

Then the wagon jerked forward and the huge grey deleff who pulled it settled immediately into their steady walk, a walk which would devour hundreds of kloms and which would separate Katia for ever from her grandfather and home. She blinked the tears away and strained around for one last glimpse of him. Didn’t he even want to say farewell to her?

Sinking down onto the wooden bench she bowed her head in anguish.

Hidden behind a tree, Kensin watched them go. The God had accepted his unorthodox way of raising the child, and for that he was glad and proud. But he had lost his little Katia, and that was a sorrow deep in his heart. For a moment, even his loyal spirit rebelled. Was he to lose everyone he loved? Wife, child, grandchild - all gone before their time. How could the God ask so much of him?

Then he squared his shoulders and prepared to endure. And what supported him most in his personal pain was the knowledge of how important the Sisterhood was to the world in the struggle against Discord, the evil generated by Those of the Serpent. For Kensin had seen them and their unclean ways with his own eyes when taking the five-yearly tribute from the High Alder to Kelandrak. They must be stopped, at whatever cost. The Lord Claimant of Kelandrak was wrong, so wrong to allow them to build a shrine. Was he, too, turning away from their Brother the God?

* * *

While Kensin walked back alone through the wildwoods, Katia sat inside the swaying wagon, her eyes downcast.

It was so large that she could keep her distance from the others who’d been
chosen
. The beautiful painted canvas sides
QUEST Shannah Jay 7

were rolled up to let the fresh air in, and the green light of the forest filtered down around them. She’d seen the previous year how the provisions and camping equipment were stowed neatly in the rear compartments.

One Sister sat on the high bench at the front, though the deleff needed no guidance. They simply walked in and out of their harness themselves. At any other time, Katia would have been fascinated by the great draught beasts used for all long-distance travel, but just now she couldn’t see beyond her own anguish.

After a while one of the Sisters turned and asked, ‘Are you all right, Katia?’ and she choked out a ‘Yes, Illustrious Sister.’

‘Best leave her be,’ said the other Sister. ‘Sometimes it’s a shock to them.’ She turned to stare at Katia. ‘What were your kinfolk doing to let you offer yourself so unprepared, child?’

Katia drew a deep breath. One must respond when a Sister asked a question. ‘No one thought I could possibly be called to serve the God, Illustrious Sister,’ she managed to whisper.

‘It is for the God our Brother, to
choose
, not for others to decide for him.’ Then the stern face softened. ‘Take heart, child. It’s a richly satisfying life in the Sisterhood.’

The thought of living inside a great stone temple in a city crowded with people filled Katia with sheer panic, but she managed to hold it back. What was the point? She was trapped now.

* * *

After two days on the road they arrived at another small town for another Festival of Choosing. Before the ceremony began, Katia stayed close to the wagon and refused to be drawn into conversation with the townsfolk; afterwards, as they rolled away down the narrow mountain road, she drew her misery around herself like a cloak and even the Sisters left her in peace.

By the end of ten days, they had left the High Alder completely and were winding across grey-green grassy uplands where herds of meat nerids grazed and the herders were already settled in their tented summer camps. The landscape was alien and bare to the eyes of a girl raised on the borders of the wildwoods, and Katia sat uneasily, feeling totally vulnerable as the great wagons rumbled along rutted tracks beneath a vast blue sky.

One day she plucked up the courage to ask, ‘Where exactly are we going, Illustrious Sisters?’

‘Far away, child.’

‘But where?’

‘To one of the great temples. You must undergo years of training before you can take your place in the Sisterhood.’

‘We’re going to a city,’ Katia whispered, her worst fears confirmed.

‘Where else do they build temples?’

Katia swallowed hard. Kensin had told her about the city of Kelandrak, with its dirty crowded streets, its constant noise and its Shrines of the Serpent. How would she bear to live among such things?

Whenever they made camp, Katia took her share of the chores without being bidden, but still the knot of misery inside her did not loosen or the desolate look leave her eyes. The other girls eventually decided that she was just too stupid to bother with. They were still in a state of wild euphoria at being called to serve their Brother the God.

Nothing seemed to dampen their joy, but their high spirits grated on Katia’s nerves.

They travelled for several weeks, taking part in so many Festivals of Choosing that Katia lost count. Every now and then they would meet another great temple wagon at a prearranged spot. Each time some of the girls would be exchanged, for the novices were always scattered widely, and could never return to their families, or even to their own claims. In this way Katia was passed from one wagon to another and travelled ever south through several of the Twelve Claims.

The first city that she saw was Kelandrak, but its details passed almost unnoticed during her early acute stage of misery. The only thing that really registered was her first glimpse of a Shrine of the Serpent and its guardian Servants
QUEST Shannah Jay 8

with their black robes and serpent staffs. The twin wooden poles at the shrine’s entrance bore the black and gold triangular banners of the Serpent. The snakes that wound up the poles were so realistic that even though one of the girls whispered that they were only carved wood, Katia could hardly believe it.

She had heard tell of such places, but had never seen one. They were not permitted in the High Alder. She shrank back in horror from the evil she could feel emanating from the shrine and gasped in outrage as the men standing outside it dared to sneer openly at the occupants of the temple wagon.

The next claim was Garshlian, with its river-borne commerce, so strange a place that even Katia forgot herself for long enough to marvel at the great barges that plied along the wide slow rivers. The river families spent their whole lives on the water, one of the Sisters told them.

After that came the plains of Netheron, with their huge herds of milk and meat nerids, and their equally plump farmers and herders who lived in painted wooden houses set in circles in cosy little villages.

Once in a while they would meet a family of traders, the only others to travel the land in wagons drawn by deleff, though traders’ wagons were not so marvellously carved and their canopies were much simpler. They would stop briefly to exchange news with each trader family. A few times they stopped unexpectedly. One of the Sisters in this new wagon was a healer and people came to beg her help for someone seriously ill.

When they came to the Claim of Setheron they kept away from settlements, travelling along remote tracks and keeping out of sight in the daytime. This seemed to Katia to set the final seal of horror on these months of misery.

In Setheron, Those of the Serpent were strongest of all and the Sisterhood was scorned, its very existence threatened, and Festivals of Choosings strictly forbidden.

What sort of depravity drove folk to attack the Sisters who healed them when they were sick and who interpreted for them the wishes of the God their Brother? Katia wondered. In the High Alder, no one would have believed this possible and they would have cried out against such heresy tainting their land, even given their lives to prevent it, if they had to.

The Sisters exchanged worried glances sometimes when Katia seemed unwilling to join in the tale-telling and singing, or when she performed poorly in the preliminary training exercises.