Taminy (40 page)

“This
girl you see before you, esteemed Osraed, claims to be none other than ...” He
paused, rubbing his fingers together as if he held her soul between them. “Well
...” —he looked from one of the twin Osraed galleries to the other— “let us
hear it from her own lips.” He turned on her, eyes hawk keen. “Who are you,
girl? What is your name?”

“Taminy,
sir.”

“Just
Taminy? Oh, surely not. What is your family name, cailin?”

“Cuinn.”

“Ah,
and your father’s name was-?”

“Coluim-a-Cuinn.”
She had to admire the way he dragged it out, the way he prolonged the moment so
that the realization would gather like a storm surge. Already she could see the
slow dawn of recognition in the eyes of those Osraed who knew Nairne’s history
well; Osraed Saxan’s face was near pale as the whites of his eyes.

“And
what was his profession?”

“He
was Osraed.”

“And?”
He cycled one hand as if to hurry her along.

“And
Cirkemaster-”

“Of?”

“Of
Nairnecirke, sir. He was Cirkemaster of Nairne.”

Confusion
tumbled through the room. Saxan was Cirkemaster of Nairne, and before him had
been Osraed Bonar. What was this strange child intimating?

“And
in what year did he last hold that position?”

How you relish this
, she thought.
How you enjoy this moment of revelation.
“He retired to Ochanshrine ...” —she swept the galleries with her eyes and
found she relished the moment almost as much as Ealad-hach did— “ ... in the
Year of Pilgrimage four hundred ninety.”

The
tide of amazement in the room crested on a unified gasp. Taminy could scent the
various forms of incredulity that rode that crest. Ealad-hach rode it, too,
throwing out his next words while the surge of astonishment was at its peak.

“Then,
are you that Taminy-a-Cuinn, daughter of Osraed Coluim-a-Cuinn, who took an
unlawful Pilgrimage to the Sea in that same year?”

“Yes,
I am.” She thrilled to say those words before all these witnesses. They were
vindication and challenge.

“But
it was supposed,” continued Ealad-hach over the swell of noise in the room, “that
Taminy-a-Cuinn drowned one hundred fifteen years ago. You don’t appear to have
drowned.”

“I
didn’t drown, Osraed.”

“Then
what did happen to you?”

“The
Meri did not want me as a Teacher of Her Lord’s word. She wanted me as a vessel
for Her own spirit. I entered the Sea and was transformed, absorbed, infused.
The Emerald Meri was manifest in me.”

A
hurricane might have been gentler than the storm those words loosed. Taminy
rode out the human gale in silence, feeling momentarily small and alien. But
within the small, the alien, lay a tiny seed of Eibhilin light, burning surely.
The hurricane would not touch that.

When
order was restored, Osraed Parthelan spoke out in evident disgust. “This
inquiry is absurd. Could not the Council see what is perfectly obvious? This
child is mad.”

Ealad-hach
smiled at his brother Osraed. It was a smile that Taminy had come to mistrust. “That
simple, is it? The child is mad? Explain to me, Osraed Parthelan, how madness
gives one power to restore the dead to life.”

Parthelan
blanched, glanced at Taminy and reseated himself anonymously amidst the Body.

“Well,
Osraed?” asked Ealad-hach, parading between the galleries. “What say you?”

Saxan
rose, now, his face pallid. “You are asking us to condemn this child as a
Wicke?”

“Child?”
repeated Ealad-hach. “By her own testimony, she is something in the order of
one hundred thirty-two years old. That same testimony condemns her as something
considerably more potent and evil than a mere Wicke.”

“No!”
Saxan protested. “I have never known her to do evil. Nor can I believe evil of
her. She is strong in the Art—Gifted. She’s counseled my daughter in the use of
her own Gift, and counseled her wisely. I’ve never heard her utter a word that
was counter to Scripture.”

“What?”
That was Parthelan again. “What of the words we’ve heard her utter at this
inquiry? She claims identification with the Meri, Herself. She claims divinity!”

A
roar went up from every corner of the room. It was beyond Taminy not to flinch.
Wyth rose from his floor-level seat and edged toward her. She allowed herself a
brief smile for that unnecessary and futile bit of protectiveness. Whatever
dire thing might befall her would not happen in this room, before all these
eyes.

“Proof!”
shouted Parthelan. “Let her prove herself!”

“Proof!
Proof!” The cry was picked up, one throat at a time, until the chamber rocked
with it. “Proof! Proof!”

The
Council pounded for order and Ealad-hach turned to Taminy with a
self-congratulatory smile. Her witnesses were now useless. There would be no
pretense of attack and defense. Her position was indefensible.

“You
hear them, cailin. They demand proof. Proof that you are divine and not the
embodiment of evil.”

The
Moment.

Taminy
came to her feet and gazed about the hall, affording each Osraed face a glance.
She could see now, into each mind, could plumb each heart—this one fretted
after what the girls in his parish would do once wind of this reached them;
that one wondered why this must happen now, when things seemed so secure;
another secretly blamed the Cusp and the Cyne and his rumored excess; others’
thoughts turned to banishment or, trembling, to something much more final.

Yet,
a handful of hearts held neither punishment nor blame, but a willingness,
however slight, to consider the possibility that she might be telling the
truth. She could count them on the fingers of her hands.

“Have
I claimed divinity?” she asked.

“Can
you say you have not claimed it?” asked Osraed Faer-wald from his place amid
the Council. “You claimed to be the Meri. If that is not a claim of divinity-”

“I
said, the Emerald Meri was manifest in me. I was the vessel of that
Manifestation, but not in this human form. She transformed me and, transformed,
I became the channel by which She could communicate with all men. When my time
ran its course, She released me and took another in my stead. Osraed Bevol
brought me home.”

“To
what purpose?”

“To
a purpose I may not reveal, because I cannot.”

“You
cannot?”

She
smiled. “I am not granted all vision, Osraed.”

“Do
not try to win me with that imp smile, Wicke. Do you say you are not divine?”

No,”
she said, “I’m not saying that, either. I am ... Osmaer—Divinely Glorious. That
is my station.”

“But
the Osmaer,” objected Parthelan, “is our most holy relic. It was given to Ochan
by the Meri, Herself, as a talisman—as a symbol of her purity and power.”

She
looked directly at him, feeling him wither beneath her gaze. “Yes.”

Another
ripple of outrage and astonishment circled the room and Parthelan sucked in a
noisy breath. “Proof,” he said.

“Aye,
proof!” said his left-hand neighbor.

“A
miracle, Taminy!” shouted someone from the public boxes. “Give them a miracle!”

The
cry repeated itself until Calach brought it to a ragged halt. Feet shuffled,
seats creaked, lips whispered the words they had been shouting: “Miracle—give
us a miracle.”

“Yes,”
said Osraed Tynedale, “let us see the dark Weaving this girl is accused of
performing.” He turned his eyes to Calach, who nodded. Tynedale raised his hand
above his head. “Vote.”

The
vote was not unanimous, but enough of the Body raised their hands to carry
Tynedale’s demand. Wordlessly, Ealad-hach opened his belt pouch and dug about
in it. A moment later, he produced a small, dried out flower head. He held it
up to the light radiating from window and lightglobe.

“I
have had this rose bud in my medicinal pouch for over a year. It is desiccated.”
He handed it into Taminy’s palm. “Make it produce a bloom.”

She
looked at the bud. It was, indeed, desiccated—dry and lifeless. “Aine-mac-Lorimer’s
body was this lifeless, or nearly so, when I began my Infusion Weave. Do you
imagine reviving this flower could prove more difficult?”

Heads
nodded and a hum of agreement filled the room.

Ealad-hach’s
lips drew back in a snarl. “You are afraid to accept this challenge, cailin?”

Taminy’s
sigh was spirit deep. “No, Osraed. I am not afraid.”

She
held the wrinkled thing out on the flat of her hand—low, so everyone in the
room might see. There was a great shuffling and creaking as necks craned and
bodies shifted forward in chairs. Before the eyes of all, a faint glow embraced
the bud and, wrapped in that glow, it went from mucky brown to vivid green.
Without water or soil, the thing grew and put forth a stem and leaves. It
branched to produce a second bud, and the first bud, finally fat and full, gave
birth to a flower of delicate white with deep gold in the velvet folds of its
petals.

The
room gave up a long, slow sigh, drawn from hundreds of throats; the scent of that
rose was as delicate and beautiful as the rose itself.

Ealad-hach’s
throat was silent and his face as pale as Taminy’s bloom. She held it out to
him. “Shall I cause the second bud to blossom, as well?”

He
struck the rose from her hand. “Fraud!” he called her. “Wicke!”

“Am
I both?”

The
old Osraed threw himself at her, hands grasping the rail of her box and shaking
it. “Yes, damn you, both! You prove nothing by this display!”

Wyth
was there in an instant, defending her. “You demanded it of her, Osraed Ealad-hach!
You gave her the test, you can hardly blame her for completing it. If she had
refused, you would have called her a fraud for that!”

Ealad-hach
shrugged away from the younger man, striding between the galleries toward the
public tiers. “This is a mere parlor trick! No Weaving is at work here, only
cheap sleight of hand.”

Wyth
bent to pick up the flower where it had fallen to the stone floor. Holding it
aloft, he followed Ealad-hach into the center of the chamber. “Look! Is this a
fraud? This rose is real! And it came from the dry, dead bud Osraed Ealad-hach
placed in Taminy’s hand!” He held the flower out to Osraed Saxan. “Is this not
a real flower? Is this not, as Ealad-hach said, a rose?”

Saxan
took the thing into his cupped hands and beheld it, his face paling. “Yes,” he
said, loudly so as to be heard above the babble of sound. “It is quite real.
More than that, it drips with Eibhilin energies—see, it still glows from her
touch. There is no fraud here.” He turned to Ealad-hach. “Give up this charade,
Osraed, and let us concern ourselves with this girl’s claim ... which you now
struggle not to address.”

Osraed
Parthelan reached over and snatched the flower from Saxan’s hands. He dropped
it just as quickly. “By God, Saxan’s right! This girl’s plainly Wicke.
Meredydd-a-Lagan might have performed such a trick as that.”

“And
why not?” Taminy asked, drawing all eyes back to herself. She leaned forward on
the box rail, quiet in her passion, her hands outstretched and imploring. “Why
not, when we are Sisters? She is as I was. A supplicant at the Shore of the
Meri, she was called into the Sea of Life, embraced in the arms of glory. It
was she who replaced me as the Meri’s mantle. It was she whom your Prentices
this Season sought, she whom only Wyth Arundel and Leal-mac-Mercer found. She
who visits you with aislinn and allows you to Weave. She is my Golden Sister.
And when her time is complete, she will come forth again as another takes her
place. It has been this way since the beginning. Yet, those the Meri calls to
embody Her spirit, you deny even the right to seek Her presence!”

The
crowd howled.

“Drown
her!” someone cried.

“No,
burn her!”

“No!
Listen to her!” The voice that roared from the public boxes belonged to the Ren
Catahn. He stood, dwarfing those around him. “Night after night I have dreamed,
and my daughter, also. We have seen this lady in those dreams. She is evil’s
blight. She is the fruit of this time, of this age, of this Cusp. She is
Osmaer. Our aidan—our Gift—tells us this in a pure, clear voice. Don’t listen
to this dried up old Osraed. Listen to Taminy-Osmaer.”

“But
we must have proof!” cried Osraed Faer-wald, when Ealad-hach could only stand
in mute, blushing rage.

Time.
Taminy felt of the room and knew it was time. There was a balance here, of
terror and fury and distrust and struggling belief.

“I
will give,” she said, “whatever Sign is asked of me. Only ask it.”

Ealad-hach
approached her again, drawing Wyth back across the hall in his wake. “What
Sign?”

“Any
you choose.” She gazed down into the dew dappled face; its eyes gleamed,
feverish, its lips twitched. Repulsed, she raised her head and, once again, let
her gaze address the Osraed Body. “Hear me, Divine Counselors. If you can agree
upon a Sign that will prove I am what I claim, I will give it.”

The
Osraed murmured among themselves. What would constitute a Sign of proof? For
what should they ask?

“But,”
she continued, slicing through the murmurs, “if I give the agreed upon Sign,
you must believe.”

“Believe?
Believe ... what?” asked Faer-wald.

Bevol,
long silent, finally rose from his seat and came forward to speak, moving to
the very center of the vast room. “Believe that she is none other than
Taminy-a-Cuinn; Prentice one hundred years past, Emerald Meri for the last
century, now returned to human form, but still in possession of the Eibhilin
Light—a Light we must look to guide us through this Cusp. In a word, brothers,
Osmaer. Not divine, but divinely glorious. That is what you must accept. And
your acceptance will become the foundation of a New Covenant.”

Taminy
had witnessed many storms at Sea, but this battered her as no physical storm
could. The room unleashed a rage that hammered at her spirit and threatened to
engulf her soul. Violence trembled in thoughts and tumbled from lips. The
Osraed were engulfed in it, as well, some demanding her punishment, others
shrilly and fearfully counseling agreement with her terms.