But Calay’s Saedran District remained unchanged. As he walked the perfectly familiar streets on his way home at last, the
sights and smells enfolded him in a welcoming embrace. He stared at his family home, the mossy roof, the flowerbeds in front
of the door, the windows covered with curtains his mother and sister had made.
He opened the door and stood on the threshold, just staring in at the familiar rooms and furniture, breathing in the smell
of bread baking in the oven and soup simmering in a pot. In the sunlit main room, he startled his father, who stood before
a canvas as always, finishing another portrait. “I’m home,” he said, knowing he sounded foolish. “Sorry it took me so long.”
He had not thought of what to say next.
Biento’s face turned pale, as if he didn’t even recognize his older son. In a soft voice, he called, “Yura! Come and see who’s
here.”
She bustled out of the kitchen with their daughter, Ilna, in tow, both of them dusted with flour. Aldo’s little sister had
grown a foot taller, gained weight, and blossomed into full womanhood. She squealed like a child when she saw him. Yura marched
forward and grabbed him in a fierce embrace. “Where have you been?”
“Everywhere, I suppose—but not by choice.”
Then came the explosion of tears, hugs, and excited chatter. Aldo told his story in great detail, then told it all over again
to Sen Leo inside the Saedran temple. Down in the underground vault, the old scholar looked as if he might cry as he listened
to all the exciting details.
Finally, smiling with great reverence, Aldo revealed the new information he had compiled for the Mappa Mundi, including the
shape and fine detail of the Uraban continent. It was a torrent of fresh and unexpected knowledge.
Later, his revelations caused quite a stir in the Saedran community. Sen Leo tested his observations, queried him, but caught
Aldo in no contradictions. As best they could tell, his information was perfectly accurate. With Aldo’s report, the Saedran
perspective of the world drastically changed.
During his absence, Aldo’s younger brother, Wen, had also studied to become a chartsman, but he had neither the talent nor
the patience to memorize libraries full of data. Because Wen had wanted to go out and find Aldo, his parents were secretly
relieved to know he would be staying home.
After his return, Aldo spent days with his father in the Saedran temple chamber, directing him to paint the new features on
the Uraban continent and revise other imperfections in the Mappa Mundi. And when the expansive revision was finished, Biento,
Aldo, and Sen Leo stood together in delighted awe.
But that was only the beginning of the work. Once Aldo deemed the main temple’s map to be accurate, he and Biento traveled
together to the smaller temples in Calay, then to other reaches where they shared their knowledge with the Saedran settlements
there. Biento painted a revised Mappa Mundi in one temple after another, clearly proud of his son.
In each settlement, Aldo sat before large crowds during temple services and told his tale again and again. As he did so, he
remembered how Sen Sherufa’s neighbors—as well as the soldan-shah himself—had loved to hear her spin marvelous stories.
Aldo could have exaggerated his deeds to make them seem more exciting, but his real adventures were spectacular enough, and
his sacred calling as a chartsman was to ensure
accuracy
. While he enjoyed being the center of attention, Aldo was much more interested in
having
new experiences than in talking about them.
Because of his journey to Corag as a young man, his many trips as a chartsman, his capture by the Urecari raiders, his imprisonment
in Olabar, and his subsequent overland escape that had taken him across both continents, some Saedrans were already calling
him a new Traveler—sometimes jokingly, sometimes not.
After all his experiences, he had definitely earned the honorific “Sen,” though he was still young. Whenever people called
him Sen Aldo, it took him a moment to realize they were talking to
him
.
He wasn’t ready to stop his life of exploration and travel. Aldo was not yet thirty years old and still unmarried. Sen Leo
na-Hadra had offered him any of his three daughters as a wife, and the young women were a logical choice, though all three
of them giggled too much and read too little. But a chartsman didn’t marry until he was ready to settle down, and Aldo still
wanted to explore the world.
Though glad to be back in Calay and well respected among his fellow Saedrans, he was restless and didn’t know what to do with
himself. He had not been born to stay at home.
Plenty of blank spots remained on the Mappa Mundi. Someday, he thought, someday…
Since his abrupt retirement, Imir had stayed out of politics so there could be no question that
Omra
was now the soldan-shah, the leader, the point of all decisions. Out of view in his own section of the Olabar palace, the
former soldan-shah raised peacocks in his private gardens, tended small ponds of colorful fish that amused him endlessly,
and played games of
xaries
with the servants and occasionally with his son Omra.
“I wish we could find an honorable way to bring Tukar back from Gremurr,” Imir said, moving a game piece across the board.
“He’s my son, too, you know, and he was a good boy… but with a bad mother. We both know it wasn’t his fault.”
“Tukar understands full well why you sent him into exile,” Omra said, his voice hard. “He was lucky to keep his head on his
shoulders. His life is not overly harsh. After you insisted on having a small palace built near the mines, we even sent him
a wife. He’s probably happy enough.” He moved his own piece to block his father’s advance.
Imir said with a heavy sigh, “I’ve come to discover that wives do not always make a man happy.” He thought of Lithio living
far away in Missinia, of Asha murdered by the shadowman, of Villiki disgraced, banished, and probably dead by now.
“You should go out and try to build a new life for yourself, Father. You were never cut out to be a hermit.”
“I suppose I wasn’t.” He scratched his rounded cheek, which he still kept smoothly shaved. “It’s time to make friends again.”
Sen Sherufa na-Oa could not have been more surprised when the former soldan-shah appeared at her doorway with a bottle of
Abilan wine, a vintage he had always enjoyed, though he never paid attention to how much it might cost. “Imir! I haven’t seen…
You haven’t said a word to me in so long.”
He held up the bottle, looking bashful. “It was easier to carry than a tea tray. Do you have something to eat? We can make
dinner out of it. I’ve missed your stories. Do you think you could tell one tonight? Maybe by the second glass of wine?”
He stepped inside, and Sherufa blushed, fighting back a smile. “I always have stories. The difficulty is finding one I haven’t
told you already.” Back in happier times she had come to him every week. She opened the bottle and poured each of them a glass.
“The best stories entertain as well as instruct.”
“I don’t want to be lectured,” Imir scoffed.
“Have I ever lectured you?”
“No, no. You’re always entertaining. Please, carry on.”
Sherufa gathered some cheese, olives, and bread, and they shared a simple meal. Before she could commence her tale, a quiet
knock on the door interrupted them, and one of Sherufa’s neighbors delivered five fresh candles. While she had the door open,
several children ran across the cobblestone street to ask if she had any sweets—which she always did.
Imir smiled. “All the people in the district love you—then again, how could they not?”
She sat back down, toying with her glass of wine. He finished his much more quickly than she did. “Now, then, why don’t I
tell you where the Saedrans came from? It’s an old story, but an important one.”
“Ah, yes. Something about a sinking island and a curse? Ondun’s stepchildren?”
“
I’ll
tell the story, if you don’t mind. Many generations ago, long after Aiden and Urec had departed in their ships, the original
Saedrans left Terravitae on an expedition of their own, with the blessing of Holy Joron. They founded a new homeland on a
fertile island continent, and from there, they built and sailed many ships to continue exploring the world. Eventually our
people encountered Tierra and Uraba and reestablished contact with the descendants of Aiden and Urec. Civilization flourished.
“But then, in a terrible disaster, our island continent sank beneath the waves, destroying most of the Saedran civilization.
The only members of our race who survive today are descendants of those sailors who were away from home at the time of its
catastrophe.” She looked up at the rapt face of the former soldan-shah. “According to legend, some of the native Saedrans
survived by transforming themselves into a race of mer-men who now make their home beneath the surface. One day, we will find
that lost sunken land and be reunited with the rest of our race.”
When she was finished, Imir poured himself a third glass of wine and refilled hers. “Very fantastical! You Saedrans don’t
actually
believe
that, do you?”
“Why, yes, Imir, we do.” Sherufa’s voice was clipped.
He looked embarrassed. “I meant no offense, my dear. To an outsider your Saedran religion seems strange.”
“And have you ever considered how the church of Urec appears to outsiders?”
He chuckled heartily, but then noticed that she was serious. He decided to change the subject. “Speaking of Saedrans, my dear,
whatever happened to that chartsman you cared for? Did you ever convince him to serve aboard our ships? I should have checked
long before now, but there was all that messy business with Villiki and Ur-Sikara Lukai. What was the young man’s name… Aldo
something?”
“He left some time ago, aboard a Uraban ship. I haven’t heard from him since,” she answered quickly, sure that Imir knew she
wasn’t giving him the complete answer. “Was I supposed to be keeping track of him?”
She grew quite self-conscious as Imir stared at her features, into her eyes; he didn’t seem at all interested in what she’d
just said. “Things have changed, Sherufa. I’m no longer soldan-shah, but I would still make a very good husband. And I’ve
certainly had bad luck with my wives of late. I know I’ve asked you before, but won’t you reconsider? We’re quite well matched.”
Sherufa leaned forward and put her hands over his. “I know the arguments in your favor, Imir, but if I wanted a husband, I’d
have married a Saedran man years and years ago. I like being alone. I like being a scholar. I like living my own life, following
my own interests. I am a better person by myself than I would be with a man.”
She pressed a palm to her sternum. “Maybe it’s something missing in my heart, but I’ve never felt the need to have babies.
All the children in the neighborhood come to me, and I’m their surrogate grandmother. I have the love of my people—that’s
all I could ever want.”
Imir looked crestfallen, and she leaned forward to kiss him on the cheek. “We
are
well matched, you and I, but you’re already giving me what I want most. I want you as a friend, Imir. A close friend.”
Imir took his defeat with good grace, finished off his wine, and stood. “I suppose I could use a few good friends, too. Think
of more stories, please. I’ll be back to see you next week.” He paused at the doorway, as if something else had just occurred
to him. “Oh, and I’ll ask Omra to send someone else I think you’ll find intriguing—another foreign stranger. The man speaks
no known language, and it is said he walked across the Great Desert.”
She had heard of the fellow, but had thought the reports must be exaggerated. “And what shall I do with him?”
“He is an enigma in the form of a man,” Imir said. “Help us understand who he is.”
A pall of smoke and a constant racket hung over the mines at Gremurr. Around the shallow harbor, tall, stark cliffs of gray
rock were laced with a verdigris of copper ore and pocked with numerous shafts like termite burrows. A maze of docks, wharves,
and chutes had been built for slaves to unload ore and pile heavy cargo into barges on the Middlesea shore.
The air rang with the endless clink of picks, the rumble of metal wheels on tracks, angry shouts of slave masters, and groans
of workers. Conical smelters belched black smoke. Connected to a polluted stream that ran down a sheer rock gully from above,
water wheels spun conveyors that hauled coal endlessly to the furnaces.
Tukar could barely hear himself think. Outside his small “palace,” under the meager shade of a green awning, he tried to concentrate
on his next move on a
xaries
board. Across from him, burly Zadar, who supervised all the slave teams, completed his move and straightened. His smoke-reddened
eyes never entirely stopped watching the Gremurr works for any sign of trouble. Though Tukar was theoretically the nobleman
in control, Zadar kept the mine complex running efficiently.
The daily
xaries
game had become a ritual between the men. For exiled Tukar, it was a way to bring a hint of civilization to this desolate
place. For his own part, Zadar enjoyed the young man’s company and relished the opportunity for intelligent conversation.
In the five years since his banishment from Olabar, Tukar had accepted his situation. It had taken him a long time to recover
from seeing his mother stripped and turned out into the streets, but Villiki had deserved her punishment. His father would
have been well within his rights to execute her.
Tukar hadn’t whined about his situation or fallen on his knees to beg forgiveness. He understood that if forgiveness were
ever to come from his brother, he needed to earn it. Omra knew him well enough to understand that his mother’s plans and ambitions
had never been his own.
In the meantime, Tukar tried to ensure that the mines remained productive and profitable. The wife his father and brother
had chosen for him was pleasant enough, though if he had any sons, they would have little future. Still, his life could have
been much, much worse.