The Council was horrified; the Farmers nearly berserk. So they had agreed: the day anathema threatened the western ar, they would act as one. Every Master would breed Cavalry. Every Keeper would open a storehouse. Every Farmer would tithe provisions. And the Counsel would appoint from among them a Commander.
Sargon flipped his hand again. Sargon, Procurator of the Northern Protectorate, Master of all wilds and wastes between the mountains; Master of all lands not accounted to any city’s ar, now had a Master’s Grip. He had begun with wasteland, and created plenty. The Keepers still held the storehouses. The Masters still commanded the city walls. But by the end of the Meeting, Sargon commanded the Army that protected all.
They disbanded the Meeting. They climbed down the cliff-face. They marshaled their trains and continued to the levees, where many piled into pole-boats. Some set out for their island cities in the delta: Shurrupak, Umma, Uruk, Ur, and Eridu. Sargon’s delegation zigged and zagged through a mesh of reed-choked byways, until they abandoned the waterways completely for the dust-cloaked hinterlands of Mesolimeris. Everywhere, as far as they went, exhausted pannes bloomed anew, the checkerboard aquamarine shimmer a living testament to the miracle of Sargon’s ar. In Sargon’s train, the saying went, there was no waste. Ar blossomed where Sargon stepped.
Or shat, more like, snorted Farmer John. It’s the Farmers do all the steppin’. Good call, though, on that young one. Young’un’ll be an ar-buster, and no mistake.
The Barrens, New Utah
Collie shook his head emphatically. “Young missy, I really think you’d better let me—”
“Uncle Collie, it is the duty of every island to give aid and support to the Seers, that they may be of aid to all pilgrims. My mother gave her life to make me a Seer. I think they will—”
“Missy, your mother didn’t ‘give’ anything. She was just a venomous old cow who refused to listen to reason. She insisted on Gathering even though—”
“You can’t talk about my mother—”
“No, missy, but I can talk about my own sister. I loved her like my own eye. But she had no business trying to conceive a Seer at her age. There’s plenty of younger women more fit to trek. She’d already seen one Gathering, and she was a late-comer to that. She’d no business trying to schedule your birth at her age, let alone schedule it to happen on top of a mountain!”
“How can you say that! How can you talk like that about The Gathering!”
“Because I am trying to make you see reason.”
“But it is your duty too! Your duty to support the Seers—”
“Missy, let me remind you, that in His Gaze, we are all pilgrims, we are all Seers, and all islands are One. It is also the duty of every pilgrim to honor the wisdom of the pilgrims of Gatherings past, who have gazed into his earthly Eye and believed. I have done so. You have not, yet. That’s just how people are. You need all the support you can get right now—not just the support of the third and fourth Gatherings.”
“But I’ve Seen—”
“—the path to the gathering place. Which none but Seers are allowed. You’ve Seen the Waking of His Eye. Which none but Seers are allowed. And now, you’ve seen the Revelation of angels! Praise Him! In His Gaze, I do believe! But you have not yet seen His earthly Eye awake! How will gathered pilgrims believe? How can an ungathered Seer prophesy?”
“Well, why do you? Believe, I mean?”
“Because He was revealed in my hour of grievous need. I lifted my hands from my face, and saw His face in your Gaze.”
But at this moment, Laurel’s face was set, hard and grim. “Well, it is the duty of every Seer to maintain the Watch for the Waking of His Eye. It is my duty to announce the Waking. “
“Missy, I can’t change your mind for you. You are our island’s Seer, and you are my own blood. I trust you with my life. I trust you to guide all pilgrims in safety and secrecy to the Gathering. But please, trust me in this one thing. Tell them. Tell them that He Wakes. Tell them to assemble. Tell them to begin the march. Lead them. But do not announce Revelation now. It will only awaken jealousy. Either leave it to later, or leave it to me.”
“But when will we tell them?”
He smiled at the “we.”
“Laurel, let it be Revealed on the mountain. You won’t be alone. You will have led them in safety. They will be drunk in His Gaze. You will be thronged with His angels. And then, when you return, Gathered and Seen in Glory, you can leave the old codgers to me.”
Collie winked. Finally, Laurel smiled. “Well, Agamemnon knows, too,” she said. “Agamemnon believes.”
“Sweet Pie, Agamemnon would believe if you told him fire was water.”
Captain Legrange’s mood became even grimmer as she approached the small knot of people at the edge of the trees. The girl was seated on a log to the left of the bridge entrance, hunched over, head between her knees, shoulders shaking. Yellow sweat jackets were piled on her back like so many remnants at a jumble sale, leaving the concerned-looking troops clumped around her like half-peeled bananas, puckered and shivering in their singlets. Sheila Thompson, the medic, was crouched down beside her, rather pointlessly waving a crushed ampoule beside the girl’s running nose with one hand, and patting her shoulder with the other. Under the jackets, Legrange saw a hint of shadow-khaki, and realized that the girl’s right arm was supported and tied to her body by a field sling. It never ceased to amaze her what Thompson could pull from her pockets, even on a morning training run.
One of the bananas looked up, then jogged up the path to meet her, dropping to a walk as he saluted, already blurting, “He’s still up in the tree, Ma’am.” He did not direct his gaze above Legrange’s own height. “We was worried that people would start walking and shit, you know, over the bridge and shit, and it’s pretty awful, but we thought we shouldn’t touch him, I mean…” He trailed off, with a furtive glance at the grim reality above him.
Legrange looked stolidly up at the horrible, waxy, crimson-washed face; at the bulging, staring eyes, and then down at the girl.
“You did right, Sergeant.”
He nodded once, then turned to rejoin the milling gaggle.
Legrange looked back down at the slip of a girl, and felt a sudden burst of anger. “Sergeant, why the hell haven’t you gotten her out of here?”
She regretted snapping even as she did it, but Thompson just took it in stride. “I know, Ma’am, I know, but she won’t leave. I tried to have a detail walk her home, but she just starts yelling and crying and finally I said fuck it, ‘scuze me Ma’am, goddam it, leave her be until the police get here.”
She said it the same way Swanson did: p’leece.
Legrange’s nostrils narrowed as she surveyed the scene. Bloody footprints were spread everywhere, the result of the first ranks splashing through the blood puddle, then being allowed to mill around aimlessly, and then being allowed to leave without wiping their feet. Worse, she could see a wet trail scuffled through the leaves leading into the woods off to the right along the Philosopher’s way. Somehow, she did not think it had been made by the killer.
“Sergeant, who passed through here?’
“That would have been the detail, Ma’am.”
“The detail?”
“The XO, Ma’am. He said we should make sure nobody came through from the back gate. He led the fallouts down there to block the way.”