The dizziness came again, and understanding with it. Yes. She knew that. She had known that for a long, long time, without even realizing that she knew it. She had symbolized it, somewhere in that sick grayness, without realizing what it was she was doing. "We're selecting, aren't we?" she said. "And we'll keep doing it, on and on, and the years will go by, and eventually, all our sons will come home, is that it? No more penis worshipers? No more trumpets and drums and games. What will we do then, Morgot?"
"We won't have any more wars," Morgot said, holding her tightly. "Theoretically. No wars at all."
"Morgot... ?"
"Yes, Stavvy?"
"Am I still not allowed to ask about... about that time?"
"Not until or unless you're asked to serve on the Council, Stavvy. Despite what you've been through, you don't know anything at all. Remember that. Nothing at all. You didn't hint to Chernon, did you? You didn't tell him... ?"
"You had my oath," she said sleepily. "I didn't say anything at all. He said things to me...."
"Well, don't worry about any of that. It will all be taken care of."
"BENEDA WANTS to visit you," said Joshua. "She and Sylvia."
Stavia's reply was a wordless cry of anguish.
"I know," said Joshua. "But I think you should."
"I'm supposed to make small talk with Chernon's mother? His sister?" she cried in protest. "What have they been told?"
"Just that Chernon sneaked off to meet you in the south, and that he left you there, and you were subsequently injured. In an accident. A fall, we told them, on a rocky slope. They think the servitor who was with you rescued you. I wasn't specific about who."
"They'll want to talk about Chernon. You know they will!"
"Oh yes, Stavvy. Yes they will. And you can tell them that the blow on your head gave you amnesia. You don't remember anything at all about your exploration."
"I don't remember anything?"
"No. You don't remember, for example, what Chernon said about the conspiracy. You don't remember telling Septemius about it. Because if you don't remember, then no one will worry about your knowing...."
"Ah. I see." She thought about it and did see. No one must know that she knew, that any of them knew. She didn't have to make anything up. She could just say she didn't remember, didn't remember. She could just lie to Beneda her friend. Lie to her.
"All right," said the actor Stavia. "Let them come."
BENEDA AND SYLVIA CAME, and came again. They talked, among other things, of Stavia's baby. Chernon's baby. How wonderful that Stavia was having Chernon's baby. Beneda bubbled and giggled, as though she had planned it, as though she had prayed for it. Stavia smiled, when she could, and said she didn't remember.
Of course, Stavia's child could be a girl. A daughter, sharing some of the qualities of Beneda and herself, perhaps. Someone to be company. While Stavia gained strength over the slow weeks, she eased herself with this thought. Corrig was gentle with her, bringing her flowers and books, rubbing the marks on her back with ointment, tempting her to eat when she did not much seem to care. One night she found herself clinging to him, crying as she had not cried since she was a child, with him rocking her to and fro as Morgot once had done.
"Hush, my darling," he whispered. "Little bird, little fish, shhh" As though she had been a baby.
"I'm not a bird," she sobbed, trying to feel indignant.
"My bird," he lulled her. "My little bird, my little fish, something dear and loved and rockable."
"As big as a huge old jenny-ass," she cried. "Like I'd swallowed a melon."
"Or the moon, or the sun, or a bale of hay," he crooned, the chair creaking as it carried them back and forth, a pendulum swinging. "Or an ancient elephant or whale. Leviathan, behemoth, huge she is, like the spread of a tree or the girth of a watering trough. Big as the moon. Monstrous huge...."
She could not stop the giggle which bubbled up unbidden. The tears dried and a wondering comfort replaced them.
"Corrig?"
"Hmmm?"
"When this is all over, will you still be here? With me?"
"Such is my intention," he said. "I have this consistent hunger for you, Stavia. Maybe it's because of all the things Habby used to tell me about you."
"What?" she demanded wonderingly. "What did he say?"
"Oh," he resumed rocking, chuckling to himself. "All kinds of very interesting things...."
"And do you see what will happen to us?"
"Oh, and I do," he said. "There will be a girl child. Yours and mine. And we will name her Susannah."
"Poor woman. She did try her best for me."
"We will go into the southland, Joshua and I and others, and we will bring back all the young women there."
"Good," she sighed.
"And we will have another daughter. Her name will be, Spring."
"Ah. And what about this baby, Corrig?"
"This is a boy baby, Stavia."
He rocked her gently while she cried.
It was the next evening that Corrig told her tentatively, as one might offer a bit of food to a possibly dangerous animal, that Chernon had returned to the garrison.
"Where has he been?" she asked in a sick whisper. "I thought he was dead."
"There was no point in upsetting you by talking about him. Actually, he's been traveling with a group of Gypsies, but he has been in touch with the garrison officers from time to time."
"Why did he come back!"
"You know why."
"Because it would have been dishonorable to do anything else?" she sneered.
"And because he knows you're carrying his child, perhaps."
Seemingly, that was not all.
Morgot came to Stavia's room that same evening and asked her to get dressed. "The Council wants to see you," she said. "Ask you some questions."
"About what?"
"Your brief sojourn with the Holylanders. They've been told all about it.
It's just that there's a big decision coming up, and they want to be quite sure they have all the facts."
"It's Chernon, isn't it? He's come back full of information about how women can be enslaved. How their heads can be shaved and they can be beaten. He's talking to everyone in the garrison."
"He is, yes. He's evidently heard that you 'can't remember anything,' so he's telling whatever story he pleases. He orates like something demented, but people are listening. He's been allowed to rejoin his century, the twenty-five. The servitors tell me the things he's saying are being widely accepted by a great many of the warriors."
"Oh, by our most merciful Lady."
"It may seem like a crisis to you, Stavia, but we've had worse. Now get your boots on."
The meeting was a very short one, mostly questions about the Holylanders and the beliefs they had held. Toward the end of it, they asked Stavia to join the Council, riot so much because she had earned the responsibility as because it would be helpful to have her as a member. Stavia was still too young by at least a decade they felt, but her unpleasant experiences had given her knowledge and insights that could be valuable to them. Besides, they wanted her under the Council oath for a whole variety of information. She, too weary even to argue, consented.
A MAN CAME to the garrison at Marthatown and knocked on Michael's door late at night, slipping inside like a shadow when the door was opened. He was, he said, from the garrison at Peggytown. Peggytown garrison was wavering. Her Commander wanted Michael and Stephen and Patras to meet him and help him out of a difficulty.
"What the hell?" sneered Stephen.
"Shh," Michael directed. "What do you mean, they're wavering?"
"Some of the men think it's dishonorable. They may spoil the whole thing. Our Commander wants to talk to you about it."
"We don't have time to...." Stephen began.
"Shh," said Michael again. "We need everything to hold together, Steph. We don't want a break."
"That's what my Commander said. He doesn't think it's really serious
, but he wants to know how you'd handle it. He thought you had the whole thing in your hand, sir. He said to tell you that. 'Michael's got it in his hand. Those men of his, Stephen and Patras, they know exactly how to talk to my men. He'll know what to do.' "
"Where does he want to meet?"
"I brought a map. If you go straight south, he'll meet you on this line, here. Two day's travel, at most."
STAVIA LOOKED AT THE MAPS with an expression of wonder. "These are the maps they're giving to Michael? But the devastation isn't on this map. I mean, it's there, but it's in the wrong place." "Yes," said Morgot.
"If they go on this trail that's marked, they'd go directly through it." "Yes," Morgot replied. "They would. If they got that fat."
THEY DID NOT GET THAT FAR. At the end of one day's travel, still north of the devastation and well away from the road which would have taken them to Emmaburg, in an isolated glen far from any human travel or habitation, the three settled into a Spartan camp and drew lots for guard duty. Stephen had first watch. Michael took a whetstone from the donkey pack and set about sharpening his dagger. Patras amused himself with a bit of carving. He was making a dagger-grip out of bone. Stephen drank the last of his tea and looked about for a good place to sit while on watch.
"How long do you think this will take?"
"A day or two. We've got time."
"I wish we'd found out about that weapon Besset saw."
"I think I've come to agree with Chernon. Besset was drunk. Seeing things. Stavia didn't know anything about a weapon." According to Chernon, Stavia had told him everything she knew about everything, none of which was important.
"Other people have heard...."
"I know. But when you ask them if they've seen it, no one has."
"A myth?"
"Oh, probably not entirely. Probably truth in it."
"I heard about a weapon once, something called a gun. It could shoot daggers a long way." Stephen yawned.
"Not much good for what we want. We don't need to throw daggers a long way to take over the city," Patras grumbled.
"Anyhow, the dagger I have in mind is a lot closer," Stephen leered. "I'm planning on using it a lot."
"On what?" said a voice.
"On any of them I can catch," Stephen answered, laughing.
"Including that Morgot of yours, Michael, when you're tired of her."
Silence fell. It occurred to each of them in the same instant that the voice which had asked, "On what," had not been one of theirs. They rose, putting themselves back to back near the fire. Daggers and swords slipped from sheaths with a slithering sound, swords in right hands, daggers in left.
"Who's there?" asked Michael.
"I am," said the voice again. "Don't you know me, Michael?" She came out of the dark into the nearer shadows, dressed all in black. Morgot. There was a hood over her head, hiding her hair. "After all we've meant to one another, I should think you would have known my voice," she said gently.
"What are you doing here?"
"Come to ask you, what you are doing here, Commander of the garrison?" There was a stump near where she was standing and she sat upon it, crossing her legs, leaning slightly forward, as she had done time on time again in the taverns, listening to their songs and tales of battle. "Tell me."
"Garrison business," he blurted. "None of women's concern."
Stephen and Patras became aware of their martial stance, of their beweaponed selves. Somewhat ashamedly, they put the weapons away and stood a little aside. Whatever this was about, it was between the woman and Michael.
"Oh, Michael," she said. "Dishonor is always our concern."
"Dishonor," he grated. "What would you know about that! What would any woman know about that."
"Much. You are sworn to protect us, Michael. Why are you conspiring against us now?"
The challenge caught him by surprise. It was a moment before he could summon the necessary bluster. "What nonsense are you talking, woman?"
"Let me tell you some history, Michael."
"We have no time to sit here while you tell stories," said Stephen, nastily. "Get yourself back to Marthatown, Morgot. You have no business here."
"Oh, you'll have time for this story," she said comfortably. "Sit or stand as you please. But I will tell it."
"Let her talk," said Michael, regaining his composure. In his lazy, half-jeering voice, he said, "So, tell your story, Morgot."
"Three hundred years ago almost everyone in the world had died in a great devastation brought about by men. It was men who made the weapons and men who were the diplomats and men who made the speeches about national pride and defense. And in the end it was men who did whatever they had to do, pushed the buttons or pulled the string to set the terrible things off. And we died, Michael. Almost all of us. Women. Children.
"Only a few were left. Some of them were women, and among them was a woman who called herself Martha Evesdaughter. Martha taught that the destruction had come about because of men's willingness, even eagerness, to fight, and she determined that this eagerness to fight must be bred out of our race, even though it might take a thousand years. She and the other women banded together and started a town, with a garrison outside. They had very few men with them, and none could be spared, so some of the women put on men's clothes and occupied the garrison outside the town, Michael. And when the boy children were five, they were given into the care of that garrison."
"Women warriors?" scoffed Patras. "Do you expect us to believe that?"
"Do or not, as you choose. When enough years went by, it was no longer necessary for the women to play the part, and it was left to the men. Except for those few who chose to return to the city and live with the women. Some men have always preferred that."
"Cowards," snorted Stephen. "We know all about that."
"You don't know. Not really. No.
"In the first hundred years, the garrison twice tried to take over the city. But the women had not forgotten their years as warriors, Stephen, Michael. They fought back. Also, they greatly outnumbered the men. It is part of our governance to see that they always greatly outnumber the men."
Michael said nothing. He was beginning to have a horrible suspicion, a terrible surmise. His eyes sought the shadows behind her. Was there movement there?
"In the two hundred fifty years after that, warriors have tried to take over this city, or other cities, time after time. None of the rebellions have succeeded, Michael. What kind of fools would we be if we were not aware and prepared for such things? Would we be worthy to govern Women's Country?"
"Who's with you, Morgot!"
"We," said a voice from the darkness under the trees. "The humble. The lowly. Those who have left you."
"Show yourselves," cried Stephen. "Only cowards hide in the dark."
"Cowards do many things," said the voice. "Cowards kill their Commanders and make it look like a bandit attack. Cowards plot in secret. Cowards breed insurrection. Cowards plan the abuse of women." One of the shadows under the trees moved. It was a man, or at least of a man's height and bulk, dressed as Morgot was, all in black with a black hood over his head and only his eyes showing.
Behind him in the dark were other shadows. Michael counted six or eight. "I suppose it isn't cowardly to attack when you outnumber us."
"I see no outnumbering," said Morgot. "There are three of you. There is one of him. There is one of me."
"I am required to tell you," said the shadow confronting them, "what our code of behavior is. We never attack merely to wound or incapacitate. If we are driven to attack at all, there is no point in leaving our opponents alive. We never kill except in self-defense."
"Self-defense!" snorted Patras. "Sneaking up on us in the middle of the night!"
"Self-defense," repeated the shadow. "The defense of ourselves and our cities. The defense of Marthatown. The defense of Women's Country."
Patras did not delay. He had been waiting a chance, waiting a moment's inattention, and he thought he saw i
t now. He lunged toward the figure before him, but it was suddenly not there. He turned to find it facing him with something in its hands, a short stick. The stick moved, spun, became a silver wheel, and Patras looked down at where his sword hand had been.
"Never to wound," said the shadow. The silver wheel spun toward Patras's neck, and through it.
Michael grunted as though he had been kicked in the stomach. The man in black vanished into the darkness. Michael and Stephen held their breaths.