Chapter 17
847th cycle of God, 36th day of
Dusasfall 14th year of the true Ascendancy
They saw Gorian in the winter garden shortly before they were all to go to the oratory to sit while Marshal Vasselis spoke. Kovan Vasselis had wanted to stay to protect Mirron but she had assured him of her safety and he had, with some reluctance, left to be with his father.
'Will he never leave you alone?' asked Arducius, flexing his elbow which was still stiff despite the efforts of Genna Kessian and West-fallen's doctors. Ossacer had not been able to do his work upon it. He only just had the strength to get out of bed after his exertions on Arducius's wrists.
'Leave him alone, Ardu,' said Mirron. 'He only wants to help.'
'I think it's a little more than that,' said Ossacer.
All three of them were sitting on the same bench, in front of a fountain turned off until genastro warmed its pipes. Mercifully not too far away now. A brazier of coals sat on a stand in front of them, its heat welcome on their outstretched hands. All had cloaks pulled tightly around them and leggings bound them from ankle to hip. Still, it was freezing though Mirron enjoyed the clouding of the breath in front of her face and the sheer vitality of the cold. If she concentrated, she could trace its signature, deep and dark.
'Oh, and how would you know?' she asked him, already knowing the answer but desiring his confirmation.
'There are few good things about being blind but one thing I do is hear better than you. And Kovan always speaks more softly and earnestly to you than he does to the rest of us, particularly you-know-who. I think you have rivals for your affections, dear Mirron.'
Mirron looked at Ossacer who was staring in her direction, no doubt seeing her through her lifelines. She smiled.
'I don't know what you mean.'
'Then you are the only one who doesn't,' said Arducius, siding with Ossacer as so often. 'They both fancy you in their own way. Who will you choose, I wonder?'
Mirron felt herself blush and the thrill of excitement rush through her. 'Neither,' she said, images of Gorian's face crowding her mind. 'I have better things to think of than boys.' Her smile widened. 'Anyway, Ardu, haven't you been bumping into Livvy by accident rather a lot recently?'
Arducius blushed as deeply as she did and rubbed a chin that was beginning to sprout traces of soft hair.
'It would be more but her parents aren't exactly encouraging our friendship.'
'She cannot be a mother of the Ascendancy,' said Ossacer. 'You are wasting your time.'
His words died harsh in the garden. Arducius turned sharply to him.
'What do you mean?'
Ossacer tapped his ear. 'You should listen harder. You know we're not here by chance. Every child born to the Ascendancy now is by design, to be like us. Livvy's parents have no abilities. Neither does she. You will not be allowed to fall in love with her.'
'I don't . . . What are you talking about? I just like her that's all.'
'And that is all it will ever be. List the parents of the tenth strand and tell me I am wrong. Gorian or Kovan on the other hand . . .' He folded his arms under his cloak and leaned back, a mischievous grin on his face. 'Both have strengths the Ascendancy needs.'
'Stop it, Ossacer,' said Mirron suddenly uncomfortable. The whole idea was ridiculous to her. They were only thirteen, all of them. Yet she yearned for the closeness of Gorian's skin. The smell of his hair and the sheer strength of his gaze.
The door to their right beneath the colonnaded passageway opened then and out he came. He was wearing a plain black cloak. The hood was thrown back and his glorious shoulder-length blond hair lit up his face. But it was a face broken and sad. Mirron wanted to run to him. To embrace him and tell him it was all right, that they had all forgiven him. But she could not. The damage he had inflicted on her brothers was still too fresh.
She felt the tension in the air like a sharp frost on a mid-dusas morning. Arducius had drawn himself up to stare at Gorian from as high as he could and Ossacer's face was blank with contempt. She didn't want it to be this way. She so loved them all. She wished none of it had ever happened but it had.
Gorian's eyes flickered from one to another as he approached. He stopped by the brazier, making no attempt to sit with them. Behind him, in the doorway, Hesther and Meera stood with Father Kessian, watching. There was a hush on the garden. No one knew what to say. No one knew if they were supposed to say anything. She focused on Gorian who now stared at the ground. It was down to him.
'Th-thank you all for agreeing to see me,' he said, the words struggling to get past his lips. He glanced back towards the door. 'I know nothing can change what I did but I am truly sorry for what happened and I promise it will never happen again.'
'Until when?' snapped Ossacer, hand stroking the bandages covering his burns. 'You never mean it but you always do it.'
Mirron saw Gorian's eyes flash but he nodded his understanding anyway. 'I can change,' he said. 'I will change.'
All their words hung in clouds of breath on the still air. Mirron couldn't find anything to say. Nor, it seemed, could Arducius though she could feel his mind working, seeking a solution.
'I am so sorry for the hurt I caused you, Ossacer,' said Gorian. 'And I never meant for you to have to break yourself protecting him, Arducius.'
'I would have done the same to protect you, Gorian,' said Arducius quietly; and Mirron felt tears pricking at her eyes.
'And I would have told you what you wanted to know,' said Ossacer. 'All you had to do was wait until I was ready. But you couldn't.'
'I understand that now,' said Gorian. 'I need you to forgive me.'
Another silence with no one prepared to say the words. Gorian looked at Mirron and she averted her gaze, staring instead at Ossacer who's anger burned bright.
'We have no reason to trust you,' said Ossacer.
Gorian breathed hard like he was about to cry. 'I know, I know. But you have to give me another chance. We have to stand together.'
'You didn't think that when you burned me,' said Ossacer.
Gorian said nothing for a while. His eyes shone wet and he shivered with more than the cold of the morning. 'Thank you for being able to fix Arducius,' he said.
'I had little choice,' said Ossacer. 'He broke his wrists so badly he would have lost his hands.'
Mirron saw Gorian react as if slapped. The shock on his face paled it more than the cold ever could. Again, she held herself in check. She could comfort him later.
'I had ... I wouldn't have—'
'But you did,' said Ossacer. 'And look what might have happened. Then where would we be? The Ascendancy quartet. One blind, one with no hands, one with no control over his temper and one who isn't sure what she is. Pretty poor for all the love Father Kessian has shown us.'
'Enough,' said Arducius and he stood up, looking powerful and so determined. 'We cannot live if we snipe at each other forever. We were born to be together and so we must be.' He stepped forward and grabbed Gorian's collars. 'I know you are sorry for what you did and I know you would change it if you could. And we will forgive you now even if we don't trust you just yet. But we have to believe in each other like we always have or we're lost. I can't do any of this without all of you.' He beckoned Mirron and Ossacer to stand up. The gesture was too quick for Ossacer to follow in the trails and Mirron whispered in his ear and helped him.
'From now on what we do, we do together. Always. And we will never hide anything from each other however small. Swear it and join with me.'
They did and joined in the embrace. Mirron gripped Gorian hard and he responded. To her left, Arducius clung on to her, his fingers biting her flesh, demanding she agree. But across the circle, Ossacer's hand on Gorian was tentative and his face clouded. For him, forgiveness would take its long, slow time.
Though it was barely past midday, the lanterns that bordered the forum shone under the cold grey sky. From his position on the oratory, Marshal Arvan Vasselis looked out over the gathering of the citizens of his most beloved town. The Ascendants sat looking small and fearful to his right. The Echelon, with Reader Elsa Gueran, stood proudly to his left. The borders had been closed for the duration of the meeting though there was no traffic expected; the cold discouraging all but the very hardiest of traders.
There were a couple of visitors in Westfallen and they were being kept away with the reason simply that the Marshal Defender was addressing the citizens of Westfallen on a private and personal matter. True enough.
Most of those citizens knew the subject of the address. None of them knew the detail and Vasselis was going to have to be at his best to bring them to stand behind him and the Ascendancy for what was to come. He glanced up at the heavy clouds and hoped the snow would hold off long enough. Kessian said it would not snow until evening. Arducius reckoned it would be a little earlier than that. Above his head, the feeble glow of the sun was just visible as a lightening of the grey. It was time.
Vasselis stood up, took off his fur-lined gauntlets, swept back the hood of his cloak and walked to the dais. The cold bit deep into his face and hands but he could hide neither and remain honest. The murmur of the crowd, bunched tight together for warmth, died to a whisper and then away altogether. The wind whistled around the columns bordering the forum, bringing in the sound of waves grabbing at the fleet hauled high and safe on the beach.
The oratory was well-lit and coal braziers stood in eight places on the stage. They offered Vasselis precious little in the way of warmth where he stood underneath the vaulted open-fronted oratory, between the two intricately carved columns supporting the cross-beam.
'My friends, thank you for coming to listen to me at what is a critical time for Westfallen, Caraduk and indeed the whole of the Estorean Conquord. I could have wished you'd brought me warmer weather. I don't know about you down there but it is perishing cold up here.'
He waited for the ripple of laughter to subside. The faces turned to him were expectant and welcoming. He knew how much they loved him. Guilt gripped him over what he was going to have to say. It would be like the end of innocence; a rude welcome to the rest of the world.
'You know, every time I come here, I fall in love with this beautiful town a little more. My family wish we could live here and I enjoy nothing more than to walk among you, drinking in your health, strength and kindness. There really is nowhere else like this in the Conquord and I salute you for what you have built here.'
The cheers were louder this time and the applause took some time to die down.
'But it's not just what you have built that sets you apart, it is what you have nurtured here over the decades and the centuries. The great work to which so many of you have been a crucial support. A great work that is blessed by God. A work that has seen most of you enjoy abilities that will one day be enjoyed by the many, not the few. How wonderful that you have been part of it. And in a thousand years, your names and name of the Westfallen will be written large in history and legend. You will never be forgotten.'
They were with him now. Silent.
'And why is this? It is because right now, the potential Gorian wrote so much about has finally been realised. And these four young citizens to my right represent everything that all of us and our fathers before us have worked for so long to achieve. You will all have read about the trials that our ancestors faced. Keeping the Ascendancy secret from the Order; constant disappointment; deformation of mind and body in those born into high expectation. Maintaining the Ascendancy strands through illness, through war and through suspicion. Such enormous problems that it would so often have been easier to give up and consign it all to myth.
'But the belief shown then was too strong and with the support of this fine town, the Echelon have continued to the success we now enjoy. And now is the time when we must be stronger and more as one than ever before.'
His tone had hardened and as he paused for breath, he scanned the citizens. His reminder of history had worked and the pride of achievement was shining from hundreds of faces. But it was mixed with anxiety. There were too many out there who knew very well that following the building of ego and pride, came the need for belief in the face of adversity.
'Because with our success comes change. And with change comes fear of the unknown and fear of the reality with which we are faced. I have heard of your reactions to our young Ascendants and I understand them, I do. Of course you must do what you believe is right for yourselves and your children. But you must not overreact and you must always remember that you are deeply imbued with what is happening here. You cannot ignore it.
'So I am disappointed that many of you are so anxious that it has led you to remove yourselves from the Ascendants and so isolate them, shun them even. They may have extraordinary abilities but they are still just ordinary children in their hearts. And they need your help to remain ordinary. They are your friends, as are the Echelon. Do not turn away at the moment they need you most. You all know that my son is a great friend of theirs. He doesn't fear them, he loves them.'
He held up his hands, noting the guilty shifting of feet.
'But enough. I am not here to lecture you on how to bring up your children, though I would like you to examine how you think today. What I am here to tell you has far-reaching ramifications for us all.
'We have reached a crossroads. The young Ascendants have emerged and they are learning their talents very quickly. And many of you are surprised, I am sure, how fearful you have sometimes been about what that means. We have all had our moments of anxiety. But what you have to understand now is that change is upon you and your lives will never be quite the same again.
'The nature of the Ascendancy is that one day it will be announced to the outside world. That time is now.'
Consternation swept the gathering like wind across fields of corn. Vasselis held up his hands for quiet.
'Citizens of Westfallen. My friends. We none of us knew if this would happen in our lifetimes and we should celebrate our triumph though danger comes as its bedfellow. I have recently returned from Estorr where I met with the Advocate herself. I have told her what we achieved here and have begged for her acceptance.'
Shock stilled every body and every voice. Vasselis smiled as best he could though his heart was pounding in his throat. Only now did the risk he had taken with the lives of all those before him register. He fought a quaver from his voice.