Taking that command to heart, Aidenist missionaries had ventured into Uraba. The Book of Aiden gave all of his followers the
freedom to trade wherever they wished, to correct Urecari misconceptions wherever they encountered them. But the followers
of Urec had not received the missionaries well, and many were killed for daring to speak of their religion. Hearing such stories
made Prester Hannes hate them even more.
As he paused before the prime church’s tall wooden doors, Hannes saw a Saedran vendor behind a small table displaying beautifully
molded candles, all of which burned with tiny protected flames. The candlemaker had a balding head, long white hair, and a
square-cut gray beard. “Candles! Candles for the faithful.” He lifted up a dark red wax cylinder that bore the fern spiral.
“Ten coppers apiece. Show your flame to Urec. Burn the light of his words in the church.”
Hannes recognized the candlemaker as Direc na-Taya, a man who alternated his wares as trade dictated; today he had come to
the Urecari church, and tomorrow he would be selling fish-hook candles to Aidenists. Seeing Hannes’s ragged clothing, the
vendor ignored him, assuming a beggar would never buy his candles.
Hannes brushed past the Saedran and entered the church. He wrinkled his nose at the smell of their pressing bodies, their
oils and perfumes, even the odd stink of their cooking and spices. Inside the vast nave, banners hung from stone arches in
the vaulted ceiling, each one covered with a written prayer, as if Ondun would bother to read them… but He was off creating
other worlds and had neither the time nor interest to read notes from the subjects He had left behind.
The worshippers entered on a spiraling path of dark tiles inlaid on the floor, walking around the central altar. The track
was designed to imitate the unfurling fern, though it forced the crowds to stand in an unnatural coil, all striving to see
the sikara in the middle of the chamber. The orderly wooden benches in an Aidenist kirk made so much more sense.
The head priestess had recently arrived in Ishalem, just as Prester-Marshall Baine had come with King Korastine. Usually other
sikaras led the service, but for this ceremony Ur-Sikara Lukai herself delivered the homily. As the red-gowned woman stepped
up to the long wooden altar crowded with goblets, urns of fragrant oil, braziers, tall candles, and other talismans, Hannes
scrutinized her.
Lukai wore necklaces of beaten gold; bangles hung from her ears and wrists. To most of the crowd, she appeared statuesque
and beautiful, but his discriminating eye could see that her face was covered with thick makeup, her eyes outlined with heavy
kohl. He saw past the trappings to the signs of age on her face, the faint wrinkles that could not entirely be concealed.
The wearisome burden of deception and lies must have aged her prematurely.
Among the worshippers, Hannes stood silent and uncomfortable, listening as Ur-Sikara Lukai invoked chants and read passages
from Urec’s Log. Though Hannes pretended to listen, his mind was closed down. He recited a litany of his own prayers and quotations
from Aiden to protect him from the heresy surrounding him.
As a special commemoration of her visit to Ishalem, the ur-sikara presented an ancient medallion of gold inset with chips
of lapis lazuli and encircled by small topaz stones. She held it up, and the trophy gleamed in the light of the candles and
braziers around the altar. Lukai was rewarded with a chorus of awed gasps. “This amulet was worn by Urec himself on his voyage.
He gave it as a gift to his wife, Fashia, upon their arrival in Uraba. It belongs here, at the altar of our prime church.”
With obvious reverence, the sikara placed it between two massive candles, each as thick as Hannes’s thigh, then spread the
heavy golden chain on a blue velvet pad in the center of the altar. “Ondun Himself gave this amulet to His son. And now we
give it to the church.”
Hannes narrowed his intense gaze. If Ondun had indeed created that amulet, He would not want it to remain in the hands of
heretics.
Throughout the remainder of the service, Hannes wrestled with his thoughts, trying to decide what he should do. Outside once
more after the service’s conclusion, Hannes crouched at the mouth of an alley, leaning against the whitewashed wall of a potter’s
shop that had closed for the church services. Wrapped in his thoughts as well as cloaking rags, Hannes gave little consideration
to the picture he must present.
A rich Urecari merchant walked past, still glowing from the service. The man paused when he saw Hannes, reached into the purse
at his waist, and retrieved three
cuars.
He tossed the silver coins at Hannes. “These are for you, my brother. God has hope for all of us. Your life, too, will shine
with the blessings of Urec.”
Hannes muttered automatic thanks to the man and picked up the
cuars. With the blessings of Urec.
As soon as the man was out of sight, he cast the coins into the alley shadows in disgust, afraid they might burn his skin.
With the thick curtains drawn and the candles lit (though it was bright daylight), Aldo na-Curic sat at a table in the main
room of his family’s house in Calay. He faced his nemesis, his teacher, his tester. He knew what was at stake.
Aldo, a clever young Saedran man of eighteen, had always admired the gruff, stern elder. Sen Leo na-Hadra had a deep voice,
a lined face framed by a long thick mane of gray hair, and an equally thick gray beard. His pale blue eyes were fearsome,
and they did not blink as he leaned closer to Aldo and mercilessly fired questions, one after another. “Name the eleven main
Soeland islands, their villages, and the village leaders—in order from smallest to largest.”
Aldo did so without even blinking.
“List the nineteen coastal villages from Calay to Ishalem.”
“There are twenty-three coastal villages.”
Sen Leo smiled. That detail had been part of the test. “Then name all twenty-three.”
Aldo did so. This was too easy.
The old teacher wore dark, shapeless robes that masked his body. Aldo suspected the older man was somewhat heavyset, but he
could never know for sure. Sen Leo slid a blank piece of paper forward, gave Aldo a lead stylus. “Now draw, as exactly as
you can, all the stars in the Loom as seen from far Lahjar.”
Aldo had expected questions like that. Taking up the stylus, he quickly made marks, needing no tools, estimating the angles
and distances with an expert eye. Lahjar was the city farthest south on the outer coast of Uraba; no known settlements lay
beyond, since reefs and intense heat blocked the passage of ships. Aldo had never seen the constellations from that distant
corner of the world, but the details had been reported reliably by Saedran chartsmen.
Their libraries held thousands of volumes written in a coded language that required expertise to read; no outsiders could
decipher their complex letters. Every Saedran home, including Aldo’s, held dozens of heirloom volumes, luxury items that most
Tierrans could not afford.
Finished, the young man slid the hand-drawn constellation map back to Sen Leo, who glanced at it, then brushed it aside. “Describe
in detail the streets in Bora’s Bastion, the capital city of Alamont Reach. Tell me in particular what the houses look like,
and list the merchant stalls in order, as one would encounter them walking clockwise across the central district from the
riverport.”
Aldo painted the picture in his mind as vividly as if he had seen these things himself. He did as the old teacher asked. He
had never been to Lahjar, nor to Alamont Reach, nor to any place other than the city of Calay, yet his answers didn’t waver.
Sen Leo watched him intently; Aldo hoped for a smile of approval, but did not expect to receive one. With each question, the
examination was bound to get much harder.
Among Saedrans, occasionally a child would be gifted with perfect recall, the ability to memorize details at a glance and
retain them without flaw. Saedran families carefully tested their children, watching for any hint of the valuable skill. Anyone
who demonstrated a particularly sharp memory was marked for special teaching, in hopes that he or she would become a chartsman.
Aldo had been developing his talent for so many years that he could answer all the instructor’s questions as a matter of course.
After today, he
would
be a chartsman.
As navigators aboard sailing ships, Saedran chartsmen were highly prized and highly paid. The captain of any large cargo vessel
desiring to take the fastest course needed a chartsman aboard; otherwise, he wouldn’t dare lose sight of the coastline. Skilled
chartsmen, however, could navigate theoretical courses and locate a ship’s position by esoteric means. They knew how to use
astrolabes, sextants, and ship’s clocks to determine the precise latitude of sailing vessels. Their intricate sealed mechanical
clocks allowed them to tell time with sufficient accuracy to calculate longitude. Only Saedran chartsmen understood how to
do it, and they carried no documents, no books or tables; they had to have every coordinate memorized.
Though their population was small, Saedrans were crucial to Tierran society as well. Even those who did not have perfect recall
served vital roles as astronomers, alchemists, cartographers, apothecaries, surgeons. They did not follow the Aidenist religion,
but they were not persecuted. Even so, his people drew no attention to themselves. It would not do for other Tierrans to realize
just how wealthy the Saedrans were, or how much political influence they wielded.
Sen Leo forced Aldo to keep demonstrating what he knew, asking him to recite passages verbatim from random pages of obscure
volumes. Aldo sat back, closed his eyes, and spoke the words as requested. The teacher had chosen one of his favorite passages—unintentionally,
Aldo was sure—a story about the Saedran origins, the continent his people had discovered and settled, which had tragically
vanished beneath the waves, sinking forever to the ocean’s bottom. Perhaps it was actual history, perhaps only a myth.
Finishing his recitation, Aldo looked expectantly at Sen Leo na-Hadra. His throat was dry, his voice hoarse, and gauging by
the thin line of orange sunlight that seeped between the gap in the curtains, he had been at his examination for several hours.
Sen Leo extended a cup of water, and Aldo gulped. The old man smiled. “I welcome you to the ranks of chartsmen, Aldo na-Curic.
We Saedrans have one more mind and one more set of eyes to see the world.”
After everything he had just spoken, Aldo found that he had no words. His mouth opened, closed, and finally settled into a
relieved grin. Sen Leo strode to the door and flung it open. In the next room waited Biento and Yura, Aldo’s father and mother.
The old teacher held on to the doorframe, as if he were exhausted as well. “He has passed.”
His mother drew a delighted gasp, and his father beamed, stepping away from the easel that held the painting on which he had
been working. Aldo walked on unsteady legs into the outer room.
His younger brother, Wen, heard the news and beamed. “I’m going to be a chartsman someday, too!” Wen, though, changed his
mind every other week, and showed no inclination for the long and tedious study required to memorize so much data.
His little sister, Ilna, sat at a table drawing crude sketches, imitating her father’s work. “We’re proud of you Aldo!”
“But he still has much to learn,” Sen Leo cautioned. “He must acquire a greater breadth and depth to his knowledge, but he
does have the skill—perfect recall. He is a chartsman.”
Aldo straightened his back and said formally, “I pledge to do my best.”
Sen Leo gathered his robes and departed, marching out into the narrow streets of Calay’s Saedran District. The teacher had
not brought a single book, map, or reference catalogue with him. He, too, had every one of the words, maps, and numbers memorized.
“We should celebrate!” Biento scrubbed a hand through his son’s curly brown hair, an unruly mass that made him look years
younger than he actually was. Right now, Aldo’s flush of embarrassment at the attention made him seem even younger still.
“This celebration should be for
him,
” Yura replied. Her long straight brown hair was bound in a scarf. Her face was smudged with flour, since she had been baking
small round loaves of bread during Aldo’s lengthy examination. “Let him go down to the Merchants’ District and buy something
for himself. He deserves it, and you know how he loves to watch the ships.”
His father put away his paintbrushes, with one last appraisal of the commission he had nearly completed—a portrait of a minor
nobleman, a vain old man whose villa was a bit too close (or so he always complained) to the smells and noises of the Butchers’
District.
Since the Aidenist religion forbade artistic expression for the glory of any individual person, even Saedran painters like
Biento na-Curic were not allowed to create private portraits. The presters insisted that the only proper subjects for a painter
were scenes from the story of Terravitae and the voyage of Aiden. Obeying this restriction to the letter, though not the spirit,
noblemen found ways to make themselves appear in the religious paintings. Biento had completed a work that showed sailors
on the prow of Aiden’s ship as the lookout sighted the coastline of Tierra for the first time. Most of the figures were vague
and shadowy in the background, but filling much of the painting was one “crewman”—who happened to look exactly like the commissioning
nobleman.
Biento made a good living for his family by doing such work. He frequently traveled so that he could do his painting inside
noble households or merchant offices, and sometimes he disappeared for days at a time, with no one knowing exactly where he
was, but he always returned home looking satisfied.
Wiping his hands with a rag, Biento withdrew a small box hidden between two thick volumes in the family library and took out
ten silver coins, more money than Aldo had ever held for his own use. “This is for you—treat yourself.”