Vault Of Heaven 01 - The Unremembered (115 page)

Penit twisted back and raised his eyes in calm compliance. “I’ve read their written testimonies. They are true accounts of what they saw.” One eyebrow rose as Penit said, “But I admonish the Court of Judicature on this point. Each of the documents varies in detail; each is given with a level of dislike or affinity for me. They are of no use in determining whether my actions were
right
.”

With a short step and a quick turn, Penit returned to his first position, a harsh glare on his face. “Quiet!” The shrill cry caused Grant to turn in full profile to the fire. Heavy creases in his tawny skin held the shadow of night. “We do not assemble to determine if
you
believe in the correctness of your own actions. What zealous insanity could be produced as defense here if we ignored the law in exchange for a criminal’s earnest belief that he was justified in his crime?” Penit approached the fire and bent close. He glared down with disdain. “You, fellow, would likely be a handful of coins in an assassin’s purse if I offered pardon for the vengeance that killed you, feeling justified in my
actions
.”

“It was
her
child,” Wendra whispered in realization. “The judge is the regent herself, and it is her child the man tried to kill.” She looked over at Tahn, all slack jaw and wide eyes.

“The particulars are irrelevant,” Penit continued. “By your own words you admit to speaking in open defiance to our Lady. You are well known to be privy to the most delicate information in the realm. You accept as truth the testimony of witnesses that describe your actions as contrary to our Lady’s wishes. And you arrive today prepared to place your ethics above the law of this Court of Judicature and the tradition of Recityv since the Craven Season.” Penit waved a hand as though to erase the insufferable image of the defendant, and stood up slowly from his slight crouch. “We could well be done now. Your head aches for the rope. Do you deny any of this?”

Penit rounded deliberately, his face slackening to near tranquility. “Yes.”

Again Wendra and Sutter gasped. Braethen looked up at Penit, his attention newly won.

“This chamber has not been house to safe, peaceful traditions since the dark seasons which followed the Tabernacle of the Sky. Solath Mahnus is a monument to possibilities, but today the chairs of many sit vacant in the council rooms, where they remain abandoned since the Second Promise. Bloodlines of families as far back as the War of the First Promise today run diluted with the cowardice of
civility
. We are now only several nations loosely acquainted across a wide land, but our vaunted speech might make it seem that we are greater than we are.” Penit widened his stance and looked heavenward, even more defiant. “We are men, women, and children. We are hopeful and able. We are grown in our understanding of much and have enjoyed peace for generations.” Penit stopped. His eyes seemed to gather the light of stars. His voice softened, deepened. “But we are
not gods
.”

A chill ran down Tahn’s spine. Penit stood resolute, maintaining his fiction, eyes peering up at a judge no one could see.

A scowl rose on the Sheason’s face.

Penit then whirled violently, his feet throwing rocks and dirt in a shower as he forced himself to a stop. “Such impudence! Such disrespect! How dare you say such things to she who is the sovereign authority, the great leader of our land! You are a mule. You desecrate the very nobility this chamber was built to honor. Such an accusation! You are not here to cast petty judgment on our regent. I will have you bound—”

Penit leapt, forgoing the turn. “Interesting that you believe my words speak only to our regent. Either you are clever to focus them so and try to provoke your Lady’s wrath, or you yourself are uncomfortable with your part in claiming the rights and powers rightly reserved for none other than the First Ones. Such arrogance has consequences!”

Sutter shook his head, then nodded, then shook it again. Wendra looked every bit the mother she would have been with her own child: proud, attentive, happy.

Penit slid to the spot of his fiction’s regent. “We return to pride so often, it seems.” Consternation slipped from his brow, replaced by pity. “But to us was given the power and use of the Will through the Order of Sheason. That gift is administered as they see fit. I may make requests of them, but I cannot compel one to give of his own Forda for my sake. It is both immoral and unlawful. So in your reasoning, have you considered that trying to subvert the renewal of a life, as you did, is precisely the aggrandizement of power over life and death of which you accuse us? You,” Penit reproached vehemently, shoving a regent’s finger toward the fire, “are the one guilty of claiming godhood. You are a traitor. More, you are a hypocrite.”

A brief turn, and Penit raised his head. “I do not believe the Sheason acquiesced so. What coercion bought their complicity? What promises were made? Their calling is sanctified; they would not be a willing party to this, since revivification is a known heresy. Only Velle draw the Will for gain. A true holder of the Will would suffer every indignity before being brought to this.” Penit clenched his fist and raised it to his mouth, his voice trembling. “Or else resist you with all the power that is his.”

Again Penit paused. Wood crackled and popped in the flames, sparks rose in orange flares against the night and winked out. The boy’s words froze them all, the severity of the recriminations casting a pall throughout the camp, though it was nothing more than a rhea-fol.

Penit did not turn this time, completing a wide circle as he resumed the role of accuser. “Let us put an end to this,” he said with a note of finality, and motioned with his right hand, bidding someone to come. Then he stepped to the far side of the fire and peered levelly over the flames. “We will hear from Artixan. The Sheason in counsel to the regent, and the renderer who began to revive her child before SeFeery came to prevent him.”

Penit gravely walked to the opposite side of the fire, where he took his place and looked back across the top of the flames. In a pained whisper, “Artixan, no. Please, don’t do this.”

Round again the boy went, his gait slow. Penit’s eyes became glassy with tears as he adopted an expression of anguish and spoke for Artixan. “A perfect child, a handsome child, came through her womb. But the babe did not awake in this world. Her Grace was grieved, and prepared to begin the arrangements to bury a stillborn infant. Such courage I’ve rarely seen. Helaina is long known to possess a barren womb, yet this miracle began, and swelled her stomach to her own delight.” A tear tracked across Penit’s cheek. “What pain then to await the miracle, and at its very accomplishment know such tragedy.

“It is not given to us by custom to call upon the Will to redeem all a child’s skies. But there was sufficient purpose in it to disregard the custom. And I agreed to it willingly.” Penit looked across the fire imploringly. “It was necessary, Denolan. Can’t you see that? You of all people? Must I say it aloud in this court? Rethink your position, please, before it is too late—”

Penit stepped quickly to his left; his countenance changed to a look of reproof. “That is all, Sheason, thank you.”

“Too late” for what, Tahn wondered. Something lingered there unspoken, cut short by the clever questioner.

In the voice of the accuser Penit turned toward the accused, who Tahn felt he could almost see. “You now have the witness of the very man who you tried to thwart. He has vowed before the council that he freely and of his own desire sought to help the child. And”—Penit raised a finger as he kept track of each issue—“he is an honored member in good standing with the order, lest you think to sully his reputation here by naming him Quietgiven.” Penit lowered his hand, looking up and around where the court gallery might have been sitting in the great round chamber. “It is your good fortune, I should think, that you are not left to the opinions of the people.” Penit folded his arms as though concluding his argument in the role of questioner.

The boy gracefully took the place where he spoke in the voice of the regent. He performed a turn and frowned toward the fire with a melancholy aspect. “You may make a rebuttal if you so choose. But be warned that lies here are likely to invite a sharper punishment.” Penit let out a long breath through his nose before continuing. “One thing more. I call on you to use discretion in the defense you make. But you mustn’t feel restricted from conveying any information you believe has merit or bearing in this dissent. No matter the costs to others.” Penit raised his brows, deeply furrowing his forehead, and said, “You are free to speak of any and all things to exonerate yourself of these allegations. Do you understand?” Penit looked into the fire expectantly.

Then, another proud turn, and his head inclined toward the stars low on the southern horizon. He nodded, and in that moment Tahn watched the boy adopt the most steadfast, honorable demeanor he could imagine. “I tremble at what is about to take place here,” Penit said in low, resigned tones. “At the foot of Julian A’sa I sat when all the floors were swept and all the animals tended, and I listened. The stories of a hundred other authors I know in every detail, and the meanings behind their words.

“Hour after hour, for years I studied the art and tactics of combat, becoming a student of the body, its movement, its capabilities, its purpose. My preparations made me of value to the men and women who occupy seats in the councils. Soon I stood in attendance to these people when they convened their ruling sessions. I saw and heard how the life of a single man could be so blithely dismissed. Later, in higher, grander rooms, it was the lives of scores of men. And not soldiers alone, but innocent people of the city and of the great tracts of this nation, whose livelihoods precariously turn on the decisions a few make around a banquet table.” Penit swallowed, his throat thick with emotion. “All this I witnessed, but I retained my hope in the simple, elegant balance of life, having an assurance that we yet choose our paths, and that the only real measure of our lives is our response to it.”

Sutter was nodding. Tahn saw that Wendra and Braethen, too, nodded in agreement with Penit’s words. Several strides away, still seated on his rock, Grant sat in profile to the fire, its light illuminating his tough, sun-baked skin. He had not yet acknowledged Penit’s tale, but his eyes showed clearly his attention to the words.

Vendanj lurked a farther distance behind Penit. The Sheason eyed the boy as though he wanted Penit to get the words right.

Then something happened in Tahn. He had the strong impression that what he was hearing was, indeed, true. But that wasn’t quite right. Not the story itself, though it might be exact in every detail, for all Tahn knew. But an overwhelming feeling of surety suffused him, as though the essence of what Penit’s characters said was right. A familiar feeling of comfort and support washed over him, dispelling his momentary fears and all that had happened since the Hollows. In an instant, he recognized the sensation as the same he’d felt when Rolen had Stood for him in their shared prison cell.

“What I have done I do not deny,” Penit continued with firm resolve. “It was mine to choose, and I’d choose it again. I’ve no guilt or shame of it.” Penit raised his arms slightly, palms up. “We meet together, build cities and communities, and draw boundaries across land to establish wealth or create the feeling of security. But our attempts to define law are paltry things. They grow out of the misconception that one group of people knows better than another. And we err when we choose a course that abuses the power of Forda I’Forza, when we assume more authority than is ours to wield. It is inconvenient, this life. But to rob it of its sting is to divest it of the very reason to live.” Penit took a deep breath and looked about, capturing the eyes of each of his audience in turn, ending with Tahn.

Looking back to where the regent might be, he said, “I do not recognize the authority of this Court of Judicature to pass judgment on me for my actions. It is a body of men and women too steeped in their own traditions to acknowledge a higher law. I hereby grant myself amnesty from the ruling of this court. Its deliberations shall have no bearing on my life. You will do as you will. But for my part, I say again that I reaffirm and grant myself freedom and liberty independent of this mockery.”

From across the fire, Braethen sighed in sympathy for this man Penit played. The sodalist hung his head and clutched the book in his hand. Beside him, Wendra stared on, seeming equally pleased by what Penit said as the fact that he had said it. Tahn thought she might in an instant sweep the boy up and hug him close. Sutter only stared, weighing, Tahn thought, the things said. Whoever the man was who Penit spoke for, he was much like Nails in his fierce independence. But Tahn felt neither pity nor pride, only the assurance that the fabric of the tale was right.

Vendanj stroked his beard with thumb and forefinger and turned away toward the night. And while the scene Penit had played stood static as each considered what they had heard, Grant finally looked at the boy, his face catching the firelight and reflecting its warm glow. It might have been the heat from the flame, or simply the brightness of the fire, but the man’s eyes seemed to glisten with emotion, the stoic face momentarily discountenanced, if only by a sheen of moisture. The exile shared a long look with Penit, silently appreciating the tale before turning back to the darkness and his vigil.

Penit turned a final time, retaking the first position of his narration. A resolute look stole over him, a look different from those of the other characters he’d portrayed. Looking at the fire, the boy began to speak in the voice of the regent. “I will excuse your blasphemy because I know you face a great challenge in reconciling justice with your own actions.” With a malicious glance Penit said, “You are no different than the host of men and women brought here who endeavor to cover up their crimes or justify them because they fear the harshness of their sentence.” In an angrier tone yet, he continued. “I only regret that I took you into my confidences. I wonder if you’d feel so beneficent had you never risen to the station of Emerit to the regent. Perhaps you have become the very sanctimonious nobility you despise.”