Five Odd Honors (64 page)

Pearl also looked less than happy, but she expanded on what Shen had said with the same courage that she’d shown in her battles with Thundering Heaven.

“Righteous Drum also says that he thinks he can adapt the spell so that it will not remove memories—or at least not as completely. We’ve spoken with various sages, and they think that it might be possible for each of us to retain a small sliver of our affiliation, just enough for us to continue much as we were.”

“ ‘Much as,’ ” Gaheris Morris echoed caustically. “I spent over three de cades of my life studying to be the Rat. I’m not sure I like the idea of my reward for hours of study and more hours of practice boiling down to ‘Thanks a bunch. G oback to selling key chains and inflatable novelty items. We don’t need you anymore.’ ”

Albert, who, as Loyal Wind understood the situation, had devoted even more of his life to the Orphans’ cause, who had, directly and indirectly, lost his father and grandfather to the strain of being the Cat, and whose mother was crippled as a side effect, showed little patience with Gaheris.

“What do you want, Gaheris? A medal? A statue? Naw. You wouldn’t want anything so noble. A bag of gold and a box of jewels would be more your speed.”

Gaheris lurched to his feet, but Riprap, the stiffness of his movements not reducing the power contained in his muscular body, rose and stepped between the two men.

“Grow up, Gaheris,” Riprap said in much the tone he would have used for the young men he coached, “and calm down. We’ve got a world at stake here—a universe at stake. We’ve got to do the right thing.”

“Why?” Gaheris Morris asked. “Why? This is the universe that threw our ancestors out, remember? Would someone remind me why we owe the Lands anything?”

Gentle Smoke, her delicate features shadowed with grey lines of pain, said softly, “We are those ancestors, Gaheris. At least we five . . .” She motioned with a hand on which the nails were broken and torn. “. . . are. You are correct. We were thrown out, but we never accepted that exile as permanent. We never disavowed our homeland. We left rather than do it considerable harm and hoped to someday return home.”

Des Lee said, his tone almost teasing, “As I see the situation, Gaheris, the Exiles are rather like people who cut down all the trees because they needed fields for planting crops, and didn’t think about what removing the trees would do to the very soil they wanted to use.”

“Or,” Bent Bamboo said, clearly getting into the spirit of analogy, “people who dumped all their sewers into a river, never figuring that someday the river dragon would get fed up and refuse to clear the stuff out.”

Des grinned at the Monkey, but his gaze remained fixed on Gaheris’s face. “So, Gaheris, by your logic, just because a mistake was made, a mistake made through all the best intentions—”

“Well,” Copper Drum interrupted, “we were very, very angry. Blind with fury, if you must know the truth.”

“Okay.” Des waved her down. “But you had no idea that what you were doing would affect the very fabric of this universe. Therefore, a mistake was made. The larger consequences weren’t taken into account.” Des adjusted himself in his chair, winced slightly as some half-healed injury pulled, and went on. “Now we have the opportunity to correct what was done. Should we refuse to replant the trees or clean the river just because we personally weren’t the source of the problem?”

“Sorry, Des,” Gaheris said, “but your analogy—while doubtless accurate regarding what’s happening to the Lands—doesn’t answer my objection. As I see it, we’re more like Jews or Japanese after World War II. We were sent off to concentration camps. Now that the war is over we’re told, ‘Not only can’t you have any restitution for your lost property, or any compensation for the pain suffered by yourselves and your descendants,
but
. . .”

Gaheris paused, one finger held high in the air. “But would you also accept a radical lobotomy in return?”

His features softened so that he looked almost a boy again, his eyes wistful and pleading. “Look, I’m not happy about what you want to do because of how it might change me. I’ll admit that, but from what everyone tells me, I didn’t change too much when I was separated from the Rat. Albert apparently got a whole lot less uptight. I’m thinking about Shen and Pearl. They’ve given their entire lives to this farce. I can’t accept a situation that asks them to be rewarded for seventy-some years of faithful service by being mind-raped.”

That final word hung in the air, but Nine Ducks, who, from what Loyal Wind had been able to gather, had found the women’s ordeal particularly horrible, was the one who chose to break the uncomfortable silence.

“I understand, Gaheris, but your noble feelings on behalf of your old friends and teachers doesn’t change the fact that unless we do something, the Lands are going to continue to be threatened, and that through the Lands your own home may be vulnerable.”

“Nine Ducks raises an important additional consideration,” Pearl said. “Gaheris, do you want to go home and explain to the various indigenous magical traditions that the threat from the Lands isn’t ended, only maybe a little delayed? I assure you, old enemies and ones we don’t even know exist will shout for our power being hobbled—and they will be much less kind than Righteous Drum’s spell would be.”

Before Gaheris could speak, a new voice, one with an irreverent lilt that Loyal Wind had been told was typically Irish, broke in.

“I know I wasn’t invited,” said Parnell, walking through a wall and sliding through the crowded room to perch on the edge of the table, “but since this matter of the Land’s deterioration concerns me and mine, I’ve invited myself.”

A murmur—amazed, angered, annoyed—rose from a dozen throats.

Parnell raised a hand, stilling protests. “Wait. I’ve intruded because I’m hereto help. I’ve been listening politely to your deliberations, but I had to step in. You’re all too close to the problem. You’re missing an alternative that might answer all your difficulties—or at least minimize them. Loyal Wind and his associates among the reincarnated Exiles have agreed they must return what they stole, right?”

He waited until the five former ghosts had nodded.

“Then let us permit them to do the Lands that honor. Then why not reassess the situation? Perhaps their sacrifice will strengthen the Lands just enough to get by until—”

Parnell again interrupted himself to consult the five former ghosts. “Am I correct that you can undo the binding that you and your associates put on the Earthly Branches, the one that passes the Branch down a line of physical inheritance?”

They all nodded. Gentle Smoke looked as if she might be willing to elucidate the point, but Parnell continued his facile flow of words.

“Of course you can. That’s what you did when you needed to take over the five Earthly Branches from your less than faithful living kin. Well then, here’s what I suggest. You five ghosts do what you’ve already agreed to do. Give back what you have stolen. However, before you do take that step, recraft your original spell it so that at the death of the current holder, the remaining Earthly Branches return to the Lands, rather than getting passed down the line of inheritance.”

“It might work,” Bent Bamboo said, his big grin filling his face for the first time since they had been taken by Thundering Heaven. “Would returning five Branches shore up the weakness? Shen? Righteous Drum? You’re the students of magic. Do you think Parnell’s theory has any validity or is he just seducing us all with that agile tongue?”

“It’s possible it could work,” Shen said with the hesitance of one who sees a reprieve and doesn’t want to seem too eager to take it. “The deterioration happened over time. The return of almost half of what was taken should help a great deal. And as Parnell has suggested, we don’t need to go on theory alone. We can test after the five Earthly Branches have been—as you might put it—repatriated.”

“Realistically,” Pearl said with that unflinching courage Loyal Wind admired, “we can also accept that you and I, Shen, aren’t going to live much longer. It will be something of a miracle if we live another twenty years. Therefore, within twenty years—possibly much sooner—the Lands will regain two more Branches.”

Albert was nodding. “We’ll need to do some analysis, talk with Righteous Drum—”

“And others,” Gaheris cut in. He still didn’t look exactly happy, but he did look less unhappy. “Maybe even some folks at home. Righteous Drum has too much of a vested interest in the Lands for us to rely solely on him.”

“Fine, Righteous Drum and others,” Albert said, “but this could work.”

Nissa said a little sadly, “Then Lani won’t ever get to be the Rabbit, and she was so looking forward to it. Still, I agree. This seems like a good solution.”

Pearl leaned forward and patted Nissa’s hand. “Don’t worry, my dear. Lani already sees ghosts. I think you’re going to have your hands full with her, Rabbit or not.”

Pearl laughed, the sound bright with relief. “To think, before I met Flying Claw—Foster as he was—I sometimes wondered why the auguries would never give me a clear assessment as to who my heir would be. I thought this was because I refused to bear children, and so confused the Tiger’s path, but perhaps the Tiger’s eyes saw more options than I dared imagine.”

Brenda’s head
was spinning as Nissa related what had gone on at the meeting.

Brenda had been thinking about herself—about how this meant she’d never be the Rat—when Nissa said softly: “Of course, what no one is saying flat out is that this means that soon the five Exiles are going to die all over again.”

“But why?” Then Brenda understood. “Yen-lo Wang only let them come back so they could fix things. I remember.”

Nissa nodded, not bothering to dab at the tear that trickled down her cheek. “What a reward for their courage—returning to life in order to be raped and tortured—and just when things are getting better, then they have to die? It’s not right.”

Brenda remembered what Pearl had said to her. “Sometimes things aren’t right or fair. That’s just the way it is.”

She shook herself. “And here I’ve been letting myself regret I’ll never be the Rat. What good did being the Rat do my dad or grandad or great-granddad? Maybe I’ll be the first in four generations to learn how to be less of a self-centered idiot. Are you going to tell Lani?”

“Later,” Nissa said. “We’re going to continue living with Pearl, what ever decision is made. Pearl seems to think that Lani is like you—that she has a few gifts that have nothing to do with affiliation with our Earthly Branch. That means she may need some training.”

“Does Pearl think you have any hidden gifts?” Brenda asked.

Nissa shook her head. “No. She, Shen, and Righteous Drum did some tests, and anyhow, Pearl knew my dad and granddad. It’s likely that Lani’s gifts come from her father’s side.”

Brenda wanted to ask about this mysterious never-mentioned man, but the expression in Nissa’s bright turquoise eyes all but dared her to do so. She decided that, for once, she could keep her mouth shut.

“When do you go back to Pearl’s?” Brenda asked instead.

“Pretty much immediately,” Nissa said. “I’ll be back for the final ceremony, of course. I wanted to fill you in first because the meeting wiped Des and Riprap out, and the five ‘ghosts’ are going to have too much on their minds. The others rushed off to start arrangements.”

And you knew my dad wouldn’t tell me,
Brenda thought,
or wouldn’t tell me everything. Or at least if he did he’d give it a spin of his own.

Aloud she said, “Let me walk you to the gate, then.”

As they walked, they talked about how they’d agreed to rearrange rooms at Pearl’s when Brenda moved in.

“You do still plan to come, right?” Nissa said.

“I do,” Brenda said firmly. “I may never be the Rat, but I’m not ready to go back to USC and pretend none of this happened. Maybe next year I’ll start my sophomore year all over, but right now . . .”

“Good!”

They hugged, and Nissa vanished to begin her journey back from this gate through the Nine Gates and home again.

Home,
Brenda thought.
I wonder where that is, now.

She didn’t have a chance to get morose or even philosophical. A male voice called out her name.

“Brenda Morris!”

She turned and saw Bent Bamboo. Of all the former scouts, he seemed to be healing most easily, even more easily than Des or Riprap, both of whom claimed to have been more gently treated. Did Monkeys have healing gifts? She couldn’t remember.