2c: Echoing Silence

[Prologue: Some Days, Episode 1, Episode 2a, Episode 2b]

Worldweavers Guildhall and the Renara Council Chamber, Atharin City, Kingdom of Renar, 4 Alana 1507 AC

"But in the last two years, not a single traveller from those cities has been seen, and not a single traveller to those cities has returned."

Tezhla pasued again, waiting for his pronouncement to percolate. This time, just about everybody seemed to understand the import of what they were being told. A couple of the councillors -- one older one I recognised and one younger one I didn't -- seemed unimpressed, and another new-seeming younger one seemed to still be puzzled.

Even so, it seemed to take a while for the full impact to percolate around the room. The effect was, if you'll forgive the imagery, not unlike the after-effects of eating food that doesn't agree with one. You can't un-eat it -- it's going to go through your system one way or the other and all you can do is hope that your system digests enough of it to get by.

But what interested me most is that the justiciar, while clearly taking Tezhla seriously, was not surprised. She had either already heard this news, or something like it...or else something similar was already afoot here in the north.

The Noliri who had been bold enough to ask the "dumb" question now ventured another, not nearly so dumb. "Has magic been attempted, brother?"

The two youngest councillors looked openly derisive at the suggestion, while the older one who had seemed unimpressed before perked up a bit for the answer.

"It has, brother, in several forms. Simple scrying, mental bonding with an agent, animal familiars of various sorts. Scrying returns...nothing. A blank. Redirect the spell north of the line and the same mirror works perfectly. That, in fact, is how we've kept track of the progress of this...pheonomenon...now that we know it's happening. Bonded comminicators simply go silent and never return; the same with familiars. They cross an invisible line and they're good as gone.

"We sent a bonded pair right up to the estimated border, along with other observers who stood a bit further north but well within view. One member of the pair stood firmly on the safe side while the other bondmate walked south. The minute they crossed the line, the mental link was broken, and the southgoing bondmate kept walking until she was out of sight. No entreaty or mental projection could re-establish the link or convince her to turn around and return to safety. This experiment was repeated four times. The second time it was much the same as the first.

"The third time, the stationary bondmate was also lost, as the border drifted further north while he was still trying to retrieve his partner. The observers watched helplessly as he suddenly began marching south, following his bondmate.

"The fourth time, we actually attached the south-going volunteer with a rope to a stout rock, so there was only so far he could go. We hoped we might at least be able to reel him back in and maybe learn what was happening. Magic was used to alleviate the need for knots that could be easily untied -- we didn't know if the victim would think of it or not, but it seemed an obvious precaution.

"When he reached the point where he could not walk any more because the rope held him back, he turned around and gnawed through the rope, instead. We were trying to pull him back, but he dug in his heels with greater strength than we would have expected. He was looking right at us at one time, but if he actually saw us, he gave no sign. There was nothing...significant in his eyes. No abjection, no pain, no concern... I had fancied that, if we could see their eyes when they become caught, we might see some spark of their personalities fighting what was happening to them.

"There was no sign that he was even aware there was something strange about his circumstances. It wasn't a blank look, mind you. There was thought there. But no sign of struggle, and no interest in us on any level. Not even annoyance at the rope. It was a hinderance to be eliminated, and he was eliminating it with the tools available to him.

"When he was done, his mouth was a bloody mess with bits of rope embedded in his gums and lips and at least two teeth missing. If he noticed that, he gave no sign, either. Once freed, he resumed his walk."

2b. The Ambassador's Tale

[Prologue: Some Days, Episode 1, Episode 2a]

Worldweavers Guildhall and the Renara Council Chamber, Atharin City, Kingdom of Renar, 4 Alana 1507 AC

As Tezhla, in full ambassadorial array (and pumped full of ambassadorial pomposity) came in, Krsia and I each almost simultaneously reached for our popcorn buckets, and settled in to listen.

"Most esteemed lords and ladies of the Renara Council, I would love to be able to say to you that I come here entirely as a tourist, come to enjoy the bounty of Atharin City during its Winter Festival. Indeed, I do intend to sample more than a little of that bounty before I depart again, but that is not my purpose here.

"Also would I love to be able to that I come here simply to reinforce the great good will that exists between Renar and the Free City of Kza. I could dwell fulsomely upon that long-established amity and never exhaust myself for words and never once exaggerate. And I have no doubt that I will have many pleasant words to say to each and every one of you, most of them sincere, over the next few days, but that, too, is not the reason for my mission.

"I am here for much graver reasons. I do not come seeking aid, per se, although if you believe you have any to offer, and most especially if you believe you know the cause of the crisis I am about to relate to you, I would dearly love to hear it. I tell you plainly that my people, and our neighbours, are deeply concerned. I come to inform you, and perhaps to warn you, for if it is happening in one place in the world, it is just as likely to happen other places, as well."

"Ambassador," came a testy voice from a seat near the vacant throne, "you're stalling."

Normally the Council was rather more formal when treating with non-members, although its internal deliberations tended to be relatively unstructured. Tezhla, however, was a frequently-sent legate for Kza, almost as familiar to the Council in general, and to the testy voice that had just spoken in particular, as they were to each other.

The testy voice had come from the Duke of Zilar, the southern province of Renar, whose port city of Zile was, along with Kza, the focal point of all trade between the two continents. Together, the two cities, Zile and Kza, were the economic capital of the world, and often seemed to be a single city split by a convenient ocean - convenient because the breadth of that ocean and the difficulties in navigating it between the two continents guaranteed the two cities' continued dominance. Somehow, the world of Aralla had been arranged such that the only really easy, consistent winds and currents brought ships into those two harbours. It was possible to sail directly to other locations on both continents, but it was rarely worth the effort.

The upshot is that Tezhla took the interruption in stride, rather than being offended as a stranger might be. "You're right, Your Grace. I am stalling. The implications of the situation I'm about to describe terrify me, but more than that, my instructions are quite explicit and very unnatural, in that they require that I be entirely open and candid in every detail, not that we have many details to be open and candid about. This deeply offends my diplomatic training."

There were chuckles around the room at this, as Tezhla intended, for he spoke this last part with clearly falsified gravity. And yet, he wasn't really making a joke. Opacity was Tezhla's stock and trade. I would have loved to have been in the chambers of the Kza Senate when Tezhla had been given that instruction.

Tezhla took a deep breath as the laughter subsided, and resumed. "It is almost axiomatic that, the closer to a market town one lives, the more likely one is to take up comparatively cosmopolitan view of the world. The result may still be strikingly provincial - the residents of the Borough of Kalarin, in the far north of this continent, despise Noliri and won't tolerate them within their walls, and yet think themselves worldly because all colours and creed of Iri are welcome to come and trade and even to sojourn if not to settle, while in their own suburbs only the bluer-skinned sort of Iri are generally welcome and in their hinterlands only those with particular shades of blue skin who worship Akaz are even admitted to be thinking creatures.

"The exact same progression exists on the continent of Hiz'ol. Kza and its immediate neighbours are as jumbled a mix of all the different sizes and shapes and colours and beliefs of Iri and Noliri alike that you could name, as Renar is. The further away you get, the less this is true, until, when you reach the near-polar south, you reach areas so insular that even their major towns only have market days four times a year, and hinterland villages can go decades without seeing a single stranger.

"I say this not because I think this Council needs an education in sociology, but to stress that we have not been withholding information. What is happening in the deep south of Hiz'ol may well have been going on for a century, and we would have had no way of knowing until recently...when contact with those market towns in the deep south was entirely lost."

He paused to let that sink in. This gave me a moment to assess the current make-up of the council. The Duke of Zilar was sharp as the sword I carried and had caught where Tezhla was going before he finished his sentence. Two of the other four dukes also got it immediately, while the other two, not quite as on the ball, puzzled it out. The justiciar also got it almost immediately, while the exchequer – more used to dealing with numbers than people and therefore lacking an instinctive understanding of what Tezhla was saying - took longer. About half the other councillors had figured it out during the pause, while the others looked like they wanted to interrupt and ask questions but were afraid of looking stupid.

Well, most of them. There was at least one among them, himself a Noliri, who seemed to be more willing to ask the stupid question than to lose the rest of the story for want of a detail. "Brother...what do you mean by, 'lost'."

If Tezhla was impatient with the question, he didn't show it even a little, but answered as a good teacher might. "I mean that ordinarily, there are people from Kza - both agents and legitimate traders as well - who make a point of visiting those market towns when the towns seem amenable to having visitors - during market days and festivals and so on. We have contact with the ducal and republican governments on something like a regular basis - I myself began my career as an ambassador to those lands. And that various traders and legates and no doubt agents from those towns do occasionally travel north to other cities in the midlands, despite their distaste for anything remotely different.

"But in the last two years, not a single traveller from those cities has been seen, and not a single traveller to those cities has returned."