The Farris Channel (49 page)

The scents of fragrant herbs, pine, candle wax and scented lamp oil dominated. The floor and tables gleamed. Precious glass glittered on the tables which were set with bright new blue and white crockery.

The tables had been lined up at an angle to a center aisle. On the stage at the end of the aisle, a large wide chair was draped in pristine black with a stand beside it. On the stand was a small wooden water barrel decorated by a knitted drape. He couldn’t quite make out what the objects in the barrel were.

It seemed every ordinary piece of furniture had been transformed with material covers.

On one side of the stage, Sian’s shiltpron sat next to the plain chair he preferred. Behind the black draped chair was a huge polished wood carving of Slina’s dagger, less stylized, more like a real dagger than the embroidery. It seemed to have been created from a single tree trunk.

At the top of the carved dagger, framed by the handle, sat a hollowed stone pot they used to serve hot soup. A wick poked over the side. It had to be filled with lamp oil.

Something about the dagger behind the chair sent shivers rippling down his spine. He had no idea why. Maybe he was just worried about all the material in the room set around open flame. He noted there was plenty of sand in buckets all over the room. He shouldn’t be nervous.

As he took his place just inside the front door, leaving the outside door of the entry chamber ajar. Across the room, the door to the kitchen storeroom opened, and Bruce stood there in a cloak very similar to his own. Behind him, channel and Companion pairs stood side by side in a line, though they didn’t all have nice new cloaks.

Apparently, Bruce had been to the rehearsal because he didn’t hesitate, and was carrying a slate. As soon as the door opened, he came right into the hall, circled the edge, swept Rimon up and muttering quick instructions, marched him straight down the aisle to deposit him in the chair on the stage.

Sian materialized from somewhere, picked up his shiltpron and began playing the tune that usually opened every celebration.

Bruce marched to a spot behind Rimon, to his right, the correct spot, leaving Rimon to sit on the chair which was wide enough for both of them. Whole families with children, streamed in. There wasn’t space for everyone to sit at the tables, so two ranks formed at the back. Parents admonished children, children complained, and others asked what they were supposed to do or exclaimed over the decorations. Obviously more had turned up for this than had been planned for.

The channels and their Companions moved through the crowd balancing the ambient. Bruce whispered, “Aren’t you glad you didn’t have to sit through the rehearsal while they figured out how they wanted this to go?”

“Oh, yes.”

“This isn’t so bad as some of the ideas. Solamar kept telling them ‘no’ and they listened.”

Solamar?

Turned out it was only a six hour ordeal as each person came up to him and recited the pledge. Sian’s music helped, setting a rhythm and a brisk pace, not letting anyone lag as they moved up to the stage and then away.

Right before that march, Bruce handed Rimon a slate with a simple pledge written on it. He read it out in a loud voice, pledging himself to the House of Zeor, as Sectuib Rimon Farris ambrov Zeor. He had read half the final sentence aloud before it hit him that they’d changed his name.

While he swallowed his surprise, Bruce took one of the objects from the water barrel. It was a necklace with a small carved replica of Slina’s dagger suspended from it. Bruce draped it around Rimon’s neck, grinning, and said, “Sectuib ambrov Zeor, you have founded the House of Zeor.” Rimon’s rock solid, unmovable, piece-of-the-furniture Companion blew the fields to smithereens.

From somewhere inside Rimon burst an ache of homesickness totally at odds with the occasion.

Embracing each other on the stage, they both struggled with emotion. The entire audience came to their feet and the hall throbbed with a mélange of emotions.

Bruce recovered first saying, “Now they want you to light that lamp they rigged up. There’s a little stool. You should be able to reach the wick with the torch they’re going to bring.”

Rimon turned to the audience to find Xanon marching down the center aisle bringing a smoking torch, flames whipping in the breeze of his passing as if keeping time with Sian’s rhythm. Maigrey marched beside him as if lighting his way with her nager.

When they climbed onto the stage, Maigrey told the audience, “We lit this torch by Fort Freedom’s memorial stone and by its light we read aloud and in unison the names of those who died that Fort Freedom could survive. Then we carried the flame of their love here.

“Sectuib, first member of the House of Zeor, will light a new lamp. This one burns not just for the martyrs who have and will give their lives that the House of Zeor may live. This lamp burns for the billion or more Gens who died in the Kill before Rimon Farris discovered how to channel.”

Rimon took the torch. There was a memory hidden inside him threatening to erupt. He stepped onto the stool, reached as high as he could and touched off the new blaze. When the first curl of smoke dissipated, the stage glowed with light reflected from the high ceiling.

Rimon stepped down and turned, holding the torch high and started to ask Bruce what he was supposed to do with it. Then suddenly he knew. He moved the stool, then flipped the torch upside down and mashed its burning end into the wooden stand that held the huge dagger upright. The flame died leaving a black mark on the wood.

Rimon turned and said, his first words as Sectuib of the House of Zeor, “Fort Freedom, Fort Faraway, Fort Intalace, Fort Butte, Fort Unity, Fort Veritt, Fort Hope, Fort Tanhara, and Fort Rimon, have all died, but all their martyrs are our martyrs. The Forts lived and died so we can live on and become something new.”

He handed the torch off to Maigrey and Xanon, and they went down to find places among the tables. It took a good five minutes before the ambient steadied enough to proceed. He didn’t know what to do, so he sat down again.

Then Bruce pledged to him as Sectuib in Zeor and he gave Bruce a necklace and welcomed him into the House of Zeor. Then Lexy and Garen and the rest of the channeling staff including Xanon came up to the stage to offer their pledge and change their family name to ambrov Zeor, dedicated to excellence.

Then families came up, and made their pledge, often speaking almost in unison, but rarely repeating the same words except for Tuzhel’s proclamation, “Out of Death Was I Born, Unto Zeor, Forever.” Some parents held or led their children, who created enough chaos to delay matters. The children weren’t allowed to make any kind of pledge, but their parents promised to raise them in the House of Zeor.

Rimon presented each one, adults and children alike, with a carved dagger and a welcome. The carvings had been hastily made, and not uniform, though some were smoother and more gracefully turned. Several people must have worked whole days and nights to create so many of them.

After the first hundred repetitions of, “Out of Death Was I Born, Unto Zeor Forever,” Rimon no longer felt the gut stirring awe the phrase had triggered the first time he’d heard it. He didn’t let anyone zlin that. They were making history here, and every bone in his body knew it.

As the pledges kept coming, his soul lifted in joy soaring with the shiltpron cadences that penetrated and shaped the ambient as well as the sound in the room. Not everyone who had built this new expanded Fort all through this harsh winter pledged. Many had left. Many others were willing to stay and see what would happen though they weren’t comfortable with giving a lifelong pledge.

Still, there were more pledges offered than there had been people in Fort Rimon last year.

After it all, he still had a handful of necklaces left, and Bruce told him they were for the spring trading expedition when they returned in a few weeks. New ones would be made if anyone else wanted to pledge, but they would be different. This set would remain unique, the Founders of the House of Zeor.

Rimon paced over to the desk and picked up a nubbin of chalk. They were conserving even chalk until the spring traders returned. “Everyone’s celebrating, and all I can do is worry. It’s just so urgent to give that coffer to Lexy. Isn’t there some way to, well, give her directions?”

Solamar thought about that. “Actually, there are a couple things we could try. I thought that her pledging to you last night might have created a connection.”

“Connection?”

“She was very involved in creating that ceremony.”

“Oh? I’ll bet she was the one who put Slina’s dagger everywhere?” He’d even found a painting of the image hanging behind his desk in the spot the painting of Fort Freedom had occupied. Apparently, the House of Zeor had acquired a symbol like a shop in a junct town.

“Rimon, you like that image. You know you do. It’s very much about what you stand for in life.”

“I always felt that was well, private.”

“I’d guess a Sectuib doesn’t have a private life.”

Chilling thought.

“Lexy wanted it for the necklaces based on some family story I didn’t quite follow about a Gen Dealer. Suddenly people put it everywhere. My only contribution was simplifying the pledge so you are Rimon Farris ambrov Zeor, and Lexy is Lexy Farris ambrov Zeor and everyone else replaces their family names with ambrov Zeor. People just spoke those pledges from their hearts.”

“They did. I wish you hadn’t made Lexy and me pledge differently though. That confuses people.”

“Oh, but you are different. The Farris is something very, very different. Only time will reveal just how different you are.”

Rimon opened his mouth to protest. Lexy was nearing. He ended hastily, “Maybe the answers are in that coffer. I just wish it were
here
so I could give it to Lexy. I won’t rest until I’ve gotten rid of the thing.” He laughed. “Not that it’s even a real thing.”

“Not that
what’s
even a real thing?” asked Lexy.

“What are you doing here?” asked Rimon.

“Garen is still in that meeting. Shani and BanSha are sitting with Clire. I came to see what I could do before your first channels’ meeting.”

So they told her about the present Rimon had made for her while he was unconscious. Rimon finished with, “So though I don’t remember making it, I remember that it’s for you. It contains everything you have to know about this House to make it succeed.”

Solamar said, “From Rimon’s way of looking at the coffer image, it is the House of Zeor. It’s your legacy for his grandchildren.”

Rimon added, “I have to give it to you when you’re not in your body.”

“Can’t we just forget about all this out-of-body stuff, a bad nightmare, gone like the Freeband Raiders.”

“It seems very important to your father. I have an idea how we can help him give it to you.”

“You want to give me the House of Zeor? But it’s yours. You’re the Sectuib.”

Rimon said, “There has to be an heir. There always has to be an heir, even when we only held the ownership of the Gens for the Fort.”

“So you want to make me your heir, more than I am already, by giving me this imaginary box?”

Unspoken between them hung the words,
Aipensha should be the heir.

“Yes,” said Rimon.

“So what would I have to do?”

Solamar said, “We’ll use the underground shelter. Give me a couple days to gather a few things. Then we’ll see if we can get you both out of body at the same time.”

It took him three days and several scheduling conferences with Val and Dakin to clear three hours for Solamar, Kahleen, Rimon, Bruce, Lexy and Garen.