NOTE:
A new edition of Marian Allen's EEL'S REVENGE has been published by Serendipity Systems. This fantasy novel was first published by Access Publishing which went out of business at the end of 1993. The new edition uses the DART interface to display the text. The novel will be priced at $9.95 per copy, postpaid to North American addresses; $11.95 to other locations. Allen's second novel, the science fiction work, FORCE OF HABIT, is available from Serendipity Systems. Allen's third novel, SIDESHOW is also available as a Books-on-Disks (tm) edition. A special package of Allen's work available for $20.00. Copyright 1991 By Marian Allen - All rights reserved
Chapter 3
That should have been the end of it. It wasn't. I slept soundly that night, unusual for me. I only woke once. The forest was still moon-dappled black, I was still alone, but, for the space of five heartbeats, I had the uncanny feeling that I was surrounded.
When I woke again, the sun poured gold and green through the trees. Something was wrong with the forest directly before me; the green/gold light was solid, blocking out trees instead of illuminating them.
I blinked and sat up. The odd patch of light wasn't light, of course. It was a riever priest, an Uncle, in a cassock woven as much of gold as of green cloth. He stood about 6'6" -- a goodly size, even when the measuring stick isn't a wizened old woman -- and broader than proportion required. His hair was white-gold; his eyes, sapphire blue glints from small, close-set, squinted sockets. His nose was large and bony, his jaw was jowly and thrusting, his lips were thick and liver-colored. He held out a pair of hands, each big enough to encircle my head, to help me up. Rings sparkled on eight of his fingers. The riever smiled a hideous smile, a deformed smile, turning down at the corners and showing teeth white as bleached bones.
"Aunt Libby," he said, in a raspy growl of a voice. "I'm Uncle Phineas. Come with me."
This was more like it. This Uncle Phineas had heard of the sexton's (his sexton's?) behavior to me and had come looking for me in order to apologize. Reynold had told him which way I had come... but how had he known where to find me in these woods?
I rolled up my bindle and shrugged it on, picked up my staff, and let Uncle Phineas help me to my feet.
He lifted me over more than he led me through. We were back at the road in less than half the time it had taken me to find my retreat.
At the road were five horses. One, currently unmounted, was a huge beast; immense, but elegant in spite of that. It was the color of old ivory. Its trappings were decorated with pearls and black coral. Uncle Phineas' horse, no doubt.
Two other horses, of normal size, black with a brown undertone, held two normal-sized -- churchwardens? -- one male and one female. I supposed they were churchwardens by their black cassocks, and by that alone. They were armored and armed. They wore wide belts at their waists; on their belts were two pockets, one at either side, black truncheons with bronze tips, and black-hilted daggers. They wore helmets fronted by opaque black veils, so that their features couldn't be seen. They wore breastplates of chased bronze; bronze threads were woven into their tunic-length cassocks. They looked like nights without moon or stars.
On the remaining two horses, which were average in size and unprepossessing in appearance, were Loach and Muriel. Loach was covered, crown to fluke, with fresh bruises and shallow cuts. His knife was gone, and his studded gillband had been replaced by the cheapest of models. There was a long thin cut up the side of his neck.
Muriel's olive skin was the color of porridge, with bright red blotches flushing her cheekbones. Her snood was gone, and her coarse black hair was wild. She smelled strongly of smoke. My first thought was of the red glow I'd seen the night before, lighting the sky over Port Novo.
I went to Muriel, reaching up to put a hand on her knee. "Your restaurant? What happened?"
She didn't answer, didn't seem to hear me.
"What happened?" I asked Uncle Phineas. "To her and to him? -- It was that sexton, wasn't it?"
"You seem to have a flair for judging character," said Uncle Phineas. "Reynold knows his duties, but he has lately begun to overstep his authority. He should have reported your presence to me, along with his belief that you had been brought into Port Novo in secret and were being kept in secret. Instead, he evicted you, and cried his accusations broadcast. The sternest measures -- you would agree if you were in my position -- were called for."
"I don't understand. You can't mean... Who did this to these people?"
"I did," said Uncle Phineas blandly. "By proxy, of course. My churchwardens, under my orders. The mermayd was... let's call it 'chastised'... and the woman was... call it 'relieved of the burden of property.' Now they're taking a little trip, and you are... call it 'invited'... to join them."
"I told you," said Loach. "Didn't I tell you? This is the Phineas I told you about."
"Tell her what?" asked Uncle Phineas.
"He told me to go back where I came from," I said.
Uncle Phineas' laugh sounded like a pistol discharging. "Sound advice, Aunt, just what one would expect from a mermayd. Perhaps you should have listened to him."
"I hardly had a chance," I said. "I fainted. When I came to, I was at Muriel's. She wasn't keeping me in secret, she was just letting me rest and eat before I went on. As for Loach, he told me I wouldn't be welcome in Port Novo, but I thought..." I looked up at Loach. "I'm so sorry, my dear, I just couldn't believe you had it right. It seems you did."
"He did, indeed," said Uncle Phineas.
"Don't you see?" I said to Uncle Phineas, feeling I was arguing in a dream. This priest simply could not have done the things he claimed. I could not be explaining things to him a child would understand intuitively. "These people have done nothing. They don't deserve this treatment. That sexton of yours was wrong. He should retract his accusations, he should apologize, and so should you. Your temple owes both of them restitution -- "
"Oh, dear me," said Uncle Phineas, "never say that."
Loach reached down and patted my shoulder. "Save your breath, Aunt Libby. You can't talk sense to a priest."
Uncle Phineas gave a laugh like a sharp bark. "Not a very gracious remark to make, when a priest is your advocate." Loach blushed the faintest rose.
"He meant a riever priest," I said. "They're the only priests he's ever known, poor tad; and rotten riever priests, at that. Why you're tolerated is beyond me."
"It's amazing what people will tolerate when they're offered no other choice," Uncle Phineas said. "Simply amazing. It even amazes me." The massive riever grasped me around my waist and swung me up behind Muriel. She flinched at my touch; then, with a deep sigh, sagged into the curve of my body.
Phineas mounted his own huge steed which, beneath him, looked like a standard-sized beast. We moved along the road at a moderate walk. Uncle Phineas began to sing a temple hymn in a voice like a flawed brass bell.
From beneath that dissonance came another sound, which grew and overpowered it; the most beautiful sound in the world: the howl of a wolf. Another howl joined the first, then a third blended with those two.
Uncle Phineas stopped singing and our procession reined in. The riever priest dismounted. "Zarni," he called. "Zurka. Rozda."
Three wolves eased out of the woods. First came a pair, a large black male and a smaller gray female. The third was a rusty orange male almost as large as the black. They ran to Uncle Phineas, whuffing and whimpering, sniffing his boots and holding up their heads for his caress.
This was more incredible than all. Wolves do not bond with riever priests. It was indecent, obscene, this corruption of Micah's creatures. And now I knew how he had known where to find me in the woods.
The pretty things moved along our line, circling the horses and nosing all our legs, then returned to Uncle Phineas. I averted my eyes.
From behind us came the sound of galloping horses. Uncle Phineas eased back into the saddle and motioned the churchwardens to station themselves, broadside, between us and Port Novo. Four more wardens, two male and two female, galloped into sight and pulled up sharp when they saw us. They struck their breastplates with their fists, at which Uncle Phineas lifted a benedictory hand.
So wardens here not only went armed, not only abused the precious people they were supposed to serve as caretakers, they also pledged fealty -- not to Micah, and to Micah's people -- but to a particular person. A riever.
But, no, these wardens weren't Uncle Phineas' -- here came more riders. Two more, an Aunt and an Uncle, in green-gold cassocks nearly as rich as Uncle Phineas'. Our guards struck their breastplates, and the new rievers blessed them. The Uncle seemed in high spirits, as if his ride had been great fun. He was only about 18, four years into his priesthood. His hair was thick, black, and curly. His eyes were as green as his cassock -- they even glittered, as if flecked with gold. His teeth were very white, his mouth almost weirdly wide, his lips thin and pale.
The Aunt was something else again. Her color was up from the exercise, but she held herself with aplomb. I had the feeling she kept her soul on a very short leash. She was in her late forties, with the smooth face of one who limits her expressions. Her chestnut hair was so fine and thin it looked like it had been painted on; it was twisted into a nut-like little knot at the nape of her neck. She was as thin as she could be without passing the line into "scrawny," a line I crossed more years ago than she'd been alive. Her skin was a rich cream color, her mouth was small, her eyebrows thin and arched. Her hazel eyes were large, coldly bright, and almost round, like an owl's. They were dispassionate eyes, without malice or pity.
The Uncle and the wolves showed no interest in each other, usual behavior between rievers and wolves.
The Aunt's eyes narrowed when she looked at the sacramental beasts, her mouth turned down and her nostrils pinched, as if their very existence offended her.
As for the wolves' attitude toward her, all three of them turned their heads away from her, presenting their throats; not the sign of submission it seems, but an insolence. They were telling her they were so far her superiors they could open themselves to her attack without fear.
Not knowing wolves, of course, the Aunt didn't know she was being insulted. She permitted herself a small, contemptuous smile.
The glitter in Uncle Phineas' eyes told me he appreciated the joke. "Well," he said. "Gregory. Isabella. Have you been trying to catch up with me?"
Isabella? Not the Isabella who had ordered him cut... I looked at Loach, who nodded at the Aunt and ran a finger along the scar he'd shown me before, now almost lost among his new wounds.
"You've led us quite a chase," said Aunt Isabella, without courtesy or humor. "Why didn't you tell us about this before you left?"
"Should I have done? What makes you think so, I wonder?"
Uncle Gregory, hearing the quicksand softness in Uncle Phineas' voice, ducked his head and deferred to Aunt Isabella. Isabella was either forged of strong stuff or lost to subtlety, because she answered the question.
"The lingering of a true priest is a potential problem for the entire Eel Coalition."
"She isn't lingering. She's been detected and removed, along with these two fools who gave her aid and comfort."
"This is outrageous!" I cried. I was even less imposing than usual, stuck up behind Muriel, who was just beginning to display some interest in what was going on around her. Still, I couldn't keep quiet and listen to such trash. "Micah's people must be free to choose the path they wish to take; easy, difficult, or no path at all. Worship has to be alive, has to grow without being forced. Otherwise, it isn't really worship." "Who's talking about worship?" asked Gregory. "We're talking about tithes."
"Tithes?" I don't claim to be quick, but suddenly I understood, as clearly as if everything had been explained in detail. "You force the people to profess to your temples. You force them to tithe. The priesthood isn't a calling, or even a craft with you -- it's a paying business with a guaranteed income. Your wardens are tithe-collectors and peace-keepers." I couldn't go on.
Gregory smiled indulgently. "Clever old Auntie," he said. "So you see why there's no room in the Eel for true priests. How could we sell our blessings, with someone around giving them away for free?"
"There are always people who only value what they pay for," I said. "Plenty of people prefer rievers, for one reason or another. There are rievers everywhere."
Gregory seemed intrigued, but Aunt Isabella snapped, "Our arrangements are no concern of yours. If anyone objects to the priesthood available to them here, they can go elsewhere. That malcontent in front of you has been a thorn in the side of the Coalition for too long. Why something wasn't done about her long ago, I don't know."
I didn't feel she was really talking to me. Neither did Uncle Gregory; his eyes were on Uncle Phineas. Phineas sat at ease, one corner of his mouth turned down in a sour smile, and didn't answer.
"And the mermayd," Aunt Isabella continued. "Why transport a mermayd? If one ever interfered in my parish, I'd gut it like a fish and cure its tail in public."
I gasped.
"Why not? Mermayds have no souls."
"They have lives," I said.
Aunt Isabella turned her owl's eyes on me with the fixed interest of a raptor. I felt like a mouse in short grass.
"I'd like to end this discussion with, if possible, beginning no other," said Uncle Phineas. "The priest lingered in my parish. The woman's restaurant is in my parish. The mermayd, as a sea creature, belongs to my parish and was taken in my parish. Their disposal is at my discretion. Please don't let me detain you any longer."
"I don't wish to press you," said Aunt Isabella, sounding as if she'd like to press him with a 2000 pound weight, "but I must insist that Gregory and I are closely involved in this 'disposal.'"
"I'm afraid I have to agree," said Gregory. Isabella ignored him. Uncle Phineas' smile deepened. "When Reynold told us you were formally exiling these two, and the Aunt, if you could find her, we thought we'd better come along and ... "
Uncle Phineas gave his barking laugh. "Were you afraid I'd slaughter the innocents, or afraid I wouldn't?"
Muriel had stiffened in front of me, and even the spots of color on her cheekbones had drained of surface blood. So it was possible; it was believable, at least, to a native of the Eel, that we might be murdered by a committee of priests.
"Don't be so melodramatic," said Isabella. "Exiling them is an excellent idea, especially in the direction you've chosen. I only wish..."
Her pitiless eyes ran over Muriel and Loach. I'm sorry to say I hid from them, behind Muriel's smoky back.
"You'd like to have watched, I know," said Phineas. "Purely to lend an official cachet to the proceedings, of course. I do apologize. And, to you, Gregory, as well."
Gregory's horse shook its head and stepped back, as if to deny too close a connection between its master and the Aunt.
"At least," Aunt Isabella said, "let Gregory and me contribute our part. You supply provisions for their journey, we'll supply the horses, and our wardens will provide an escort to the edge of the wood. Why should you bear the full responsibility for this? That's part of what the Coalition is all about."
"True," said Phineas. "The blame attaches to no one if it attaches to everyone."
"Exactly," said Gregory, as if he hadn't just heard a monstrous piece of sophistry.
Phineas shrugged. "Very well, then. Come join me for a cold luncheon, and let the wardens see to it."
Chapter 4
We continued east but, before long, we turned onto a path leading south. The path led to a sort of farmyard. A flock of half-wild chickens gave grudging way to our horses. Goats peered around corners of various outbuildings. Beyond an artesian well stood a solid little stone cottage.
"Welcome to my Retreat," Uncle Phineas said to me, with a repellent smile. His Retreat, indeed! Did this riever plan to warp and foul every aspect of priesthood that most rievers were content merely to reject?
While the rievers went into the cottage for their luncheon, we were taken off Uncle Phineas' horses; Muriel and I were made to sit on the ground and Loach was made to coil there. A warden stood over each of us.
Uncle Phineas' female warden went from one outbuilding to another, filling my provision sack. When she had finished, she passed around some bread and cheese and brought us some water from the well. I noticed that Loach shied whenever she came near him, and Muriel deliberately turned her head to keep the warden out of her sight; I wondered if this warden had been the one to carry out Uncle Phineas' punishments. Still, when one of the other wardens suggested, with delight at his own happy thought, that she dump the water bucket over Loach's head, she merely held the dipper to the tad's lips and let him drink.
One of the male wardens went into the cottage and came out with Uncle Phineas. By the riever's orders, Loach was put on Aunt Isabella's horse; Muriel and I, on Uncle Gregory's. Our provision sacks and waterskins were hung from our saddles. Uncle Phineas' churchwardens joined him in front of his cottage. The other four, mounted, surrounded us.
"You packed their bags ... properly?" Uncle Phineas asked his warden. She nodded. His mouth turned down in his horrible smile as he said to us, "Go with Micah."
So we set off again, led, followed, and flanked by Aunt Isabella's and Uncle Gregory's churchwardens. We came to the road and turned left -- east again.
"I'd say you just had a narrow escape," one of the wardens said.
"Would you?" said Muriel, as if she disagreed.
"I wouldn't want to be off in the woods with Uncle Phineas."
"Would you rather cross the Crescent Desert with supplies packed by his order?"
Loach jerked as if he'd been slapped. "The desert?"
I stretched over and patted his arm. "Don't worry, dear. I've crossed deserts before. We can do it."
"We could kill the scaletail for you before you start across," the first warden said kindly. "Then you'll each have a horse and you can split its stuff."
"You are speaking to a true priest of Micah," I said sharply. "A true priest isn't as discriminating about who 'deserves' to live as some I've met recently."
"All right, Auntie. Sorry."
The wardens began giving me sideways looks. They were thinking. I hoped it didn't do them any harm.
The woods got scrubby again, the sandy soil became sand. "This is as far as we go," said one of the wardens. "We'll watch you out of sight. Just go straight."
"I might say the same to you," I said snappishly.
We gave our backs to the Eel. For the moment, at least, I was glad to be shut of it. I felt like someone who's been washed overboard in her sleep, caught in opposing currents, then miraculously beached.
The sun, behind us, cast indigo shadows beyond the sand- ripples and succulents. Paloverde shrubs made long puddles of shade.
"See those?" I said to Loach, nodding to the canary- blossomed plants. "They mean water, just a few feet down. We can dig for it, if we have to. They draw bees, which can mean honey, and grazing animals, which can mean meat."
"And meat-eaters," said Muriel.
"They'll be shy of three of us," I said.
"Then we'll freeze," said Muriel, sounding as if she were losing interest again.
"Freeze?" Loach said, laughing. "In the desert? I'm frying in my own oil, here." He was, indeed, covered to running with sweat, oily with protective salve.
"It gets cold in the desert at night," Muriel said.
I don't think he believed her then, but he soon did. As the sun sank behind us, the heat became noticeably less harsh. We decided to make camp under the thorny branches of a blue- gray smoke tree. We dismounted and unsaddled the horses, hobbling them near a large patch of mesquite. Loach curled and spread the webbed fingers of one hand to make a cup, poured water into it, and held it out to his horse. When it had drunk to satisfaction, he did the same for the other horse.
By the time he had finished, the sun had set and the air was almost cool.
"It is getting cold," said Loach. "What'll we do?"
"Freeze," Muriel said flatly.
Poor Loach. Muriel had known him, she said, since his childhood, but she seemed to forget that his childhood hadn't been very long ago.
I slipped an arm around his waist and hugged him. "We'll be all right. I have a blanket and an extra cassock in my bindle; we can huddle under them and keep one another warm. It won't get colder than an overcast day in late fall. That won't freeze you, will it, dear?"
"No," he said, cautiously.
Muriel put her arms around our horse's neck and began to cry. The horse turned its head and snuffed at Muriel's hair, as black and coarse as its own thick mane.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I'm sorry, Loach. That was my place. I lived there. It was everything; all I had. And I'm frightened."
"Well, don't be." I turned from Loach to her. "We're all well away from that place. The desert is full of food and drink if you know how to find it. Tomorrow, we'll -- "
"Hey, look!" Loach said.
All the supply bags were open. One lay empty by Loach's flukes. Cloth tumbled from his webbed hands onto the sand. "Thermacloth," he said. "Three blankets. And packets of smoked fish and dried meat and crackerbread. And -- " he held up a pouch the size of his doubled fists -- "tinder. And a tinder- box. And," he reached under the thermacloth, "my knives."
We all looked at each other.
"That warden..." Muriel said.
"'That warden' is right," said Loach. "Three blankets. One for each of us, even the mermayd. I don't get it." After a moment, he began gathering dead branches and leaves from beneath the smoke tree and mesquite bushes. "You're right, Auntie," he said. "We'll be warm and safe. And look at the sky -- almost as gorgeous as out to sea."
The moon was rising, pink and full. The stars silvered the deep purple sky.
Muriel and I smiled at each other as Loach, all strength and courage now, sang a sea-song in the desert.
I woke the others just after dawn.
Loach had quite a time getting back in the saddle without the aid of at least two strong landfolk. He finally came up with a combination spring/haul that got him on without shocking the horse.
Muriel seemed calmer and more animated than the day before. When we were ready to leave, I said, "Which way?"
"Which way?" said Muriel.
"Due east," said Loach.
"We were sent out due east, but we don't have to continue that way. We can turn south, toward the cliffs, or north, toward the delta. Or, we can go back into the Eel."
"Go back?" said Loach. "Why should we go back? We've got what we need to cross the desert, and the world is beyond that."
Muriel frowned. "I don't want to go back. Not to Port Novo, not anywhere in the Eel. Let them have their tithes and lord it over everybody. They burned me out -- there's their tithes for them!"
Loach shouted, "East, east!"
So we continued east. Loach chattered, making Muriel laugh and turning her slowly toward the future.
I couldn't shake the feeling that I was doing the wrong thing. I had always been taught -- I had always found it to be true -- that people got the priest they deserved. But the priesthood of the Eel seemed to have created an area of exception. Riever priests had become a majority in the Eel and, contrary to all precedent, had formed some sort of coalition. Somehow, probably by violence or threats of violence, they had driven all the true priests from their parishes, or stolen all the parishioners from the true priests. They abused power; they used power -- in a priest of Micah, there's no difference. To turn my back on such depravity was wrong. I told myself that I was only one old, worn-out woman. I could have no effect. The best thing I could do would be to cross the desert and see if I could interest any young clergy in trying to loosen the rievers' hold on the people of the Eel.
Muriel and Loach stopped talking abruptly.
"What is it?" I asked.
"Listen," Muriel whispered.
Hoofbeats, from the other side of the low ridge we'd just left behind.
We turned the horses.
The head of a rider appeared at the top of the ridge. A woman. She slowed when she saw us and approached at a walk. She was large and beefy, ruddy and blunt-featured. Her curly brown hair was cropped short; her robin's-egg-blue eyes slanted slightly upward toward her temples. Her hose and cotehardie were of undyed linen.
"Did they throw you out, too?" Loach asked.
"No," the woman said, with a nervous smile. "I came after her." She nodded to me.
"What for?" Muriel snapped.
"Well... Because I wanted to find her. My name's Clare, by the way."
We told her our names.
"I heard about what happened," Clare said. "It was a shame."
"And so you rode away to join us!" said Loach.
"...No."
"What, then," Muriel asked.
"My youngest brother, who lives with me... He turned ten last year, and he's fertile, and he's bonded with a wife."
"Oh, how lovely!" I said.
"So?" said Muriel.
"So he's just had their baby." Clare's blunt features softened. "A boy. Best-looking baby --"
"What do you want?" asked Muriel.
"Take it easy," said Loach. "She's getting to it."
"Yes. Well, Isaac, that's my brother, and Hilda, that's my bondsister, don't even remember what a true priest is like. After all, they're only ten-eleven years old, and the Coalition took over when they were two-three."
"Eight years!"
"Eight years," said Muriel, bitterly.
"No wonder I didn't know anything about it," said Loach.
"So we were hoping I could stop you before you got too far and maybe bring you back for a few days. We were hoping you'd baptize little Evrard."
"Bring her back for a few days!" said Muriel. "We barely escaped bloody murder back there because we gave her an afternoon nap. You can't take her back for a few days."
"Please, dear," I said to Muriel. To Clare, I said, "I'm afraid it would be too dangerous for you. For all of you."
"But we don't live in town," she said. "We live in the woods. No one will know you're there and, when you're ready to leave, I'll send you home along the edge of the desert, or take you to the trade route and put you into a caravan to Batumi. That's another reason I wanted to catch you up," she said to Muriel. "This is the widest part of the Crescent. If you keep going due east -- well, you could probably make it across, but you'd have a bad time of it. Veer a little northwards here and you'll cross the trade route not far from Batumi."
Muriel didn't answer her, but Loach said, "Thanks."
"So will you come?" Clare asked.
"No!" said Muriel.
"Yes," I said. "I won't be in any danger. None that counts, anyway." I put a hand on Muriel's arm, and one on Loach's. "I wish our acquaintance hadn't been so brief, or so ... eventful." Loach laughed. "But I am glad I met you both. Thank you both again. And I am so dreadfully sorry for what you suffered on my account."
Muriel's olive cheeks were flushed. I put a hand to one of them.
"I know you're angry with the Eel and everyone in it. But I'm not. I have to go back with this young woman. I'm needed."
Muriel's eyes shone with tears.
"I'm needed here more," I said. Stay with me, if you want to, both of you."
Muriel shook her head.
"Me either, Auntie," said Loach. "You don't mind, do you?"
"No, of course not. I think it's best." I wiped away
Muriel's tears with my palm. "Micah's grace and blessing are with you. And with you," I said to Loach.
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. Feb. 2000; Oct. 2001