Ten Years Ago
Santabe kept her right hand firmly on her Diviner as she strolled through the plaza of the Ninth Sun, clasping the weapon tightly. The shoppers in the market might give her a satisfyingly wide berth, but she had been free to walk without companionship as an Enforcer for only two moon revolutions yet. She did not trust her ability to reach the Diviner before one of the Disgraced. The other priests of Dal would laugh if she admitted her fear of dying to her own Diviner, so she did not tell them. Her training to become a priest had been hard, and she had learned quickly to keep her mouth shut to avoid the strap or worse punishment.
But on patrol, punishment was the least of her worries. She knew firsthand how deceptive a Disgraced could be. They would do anything to save their miserable hides, so frightened of being sent to another life. She wouldn’t put it past them to stalk a searching Enforcer for the chance to kill first by taking their Diviner. She might have patrolled as an apprentice only for one sun revolution, but she had heard the rumors and seen much of the Disgraced’s trickiness. Sadly, one could not spot a Disgraced simply by looking. If that were true, there would be no Enforcers.
The people at a fruit stall moved aside as her stride slowed to look at the melons on display. With Dal high in the sky and hours of walking behind her, the sight of the melons made her mouth water. The man at the stall hastily held out a mango. “For you, Honored One. My gift.” He bowed with an oily smile that made her check him again before taking the mango.
“Walk with the sun on your face,” she snapped testily and the man flinched. His customers suddenly found other places to be. Such cringing still irritated her. How much easier it would be to ferret out the Disgraced for sacrifice if she didn’t need to dress as a priestess. Then the people would speak freely around her and her moon-revolution number of sacrificed would be held in awe. She’d earn her first Sun-Blessed earring in half the time.
Blasphemy, the trained part of her mind shouted.
To hide from Dal was the choice of a Disgraced. Only an Enforcer of the highest level forwent the sheer-white clothing of their calling and only with permission because they hunted. She did not qualify for that honor. The bite of mango in her mouth tasted as dry as dust and she dropped the fruit to the cobblestones. She did not deserve a reward this day. She would confess her faults at the temple when her shift ended and accept the strap with head high.
Even as she turned her back, her eyes tracked furtive movement among the passersby. A child bent as small as a rat slunk for the dropped mango among the many feet. It held an arm outstretched and eyes down. Santabe took a step away, then spun lightning quick, coming up with the child fast in her grip.
“Thief,” she snarled, eyes blazing.
The child sniveled in her hand, not even attempting to escape. Scrawny and underfed, it stared at her with hazel eyes under matted hair.
“Thievery is forbidden. You know this.”
“Yes, Honored One,” it wheezed, spreading its breath upon her hand and arm. She almost dropped it then and there. It probably crawled with fleas as well as being filthy. Its tiny body hadn’t the blood to fuel two Diviners. But the law was clear, she couldn’t wait for this one to grow up and become more of an offense to Dal.
Almost casually, she freed her Diviner from her belt and had mercy on the child, sending it to another life with a touch. All its muscles locked for an instant, the eyes staring at her with shock, and then she let it drop lifeless at her feet.
A shame.
Her act of mercy to spare it from sacrifice meant she couldn’t add this Disgraced soul to her moon-revolution totals. Only a full blood sacrifice of hands and head counted. She would never earn her earring of rank this way. A kick of her foot turned the body so its dead eyes no longer looked her way.
She had no patience with those who pitied the poor. The poor could abide by the laws of Dal the same as everyone else. If they starved, then they should do so lawfully and have the satisfaction of passing to the next life.
On this, the church agreed with her. The priesthood didn’t go so far as to condone that poverty or disease was the hand of Dal casting judgment on a soul and showing them as undeserving—yet. When it did, she would find it much easier to produce sacrifices for the cause.
She nodded at the body. “See that is cleaned up,” she told the owner of the fruit stall.
He knocked his forehead to the ground, and she rolled her eyes. She didn’t remember her mother or aunts being this servile. Most shoppers entering the fruit market turned around and went the other way. Santabe gazed suspiciously at any who did enter as they could be Disgraced trying to appear normal. Then she realized the people not so much rushed from her as toward the fabric market with excited whispers.
She secured her Diviner in her belt and set off that way. Where the people found excitement, there was often a Disgraced waiting to be discovered. High Priest Jemkinbu had recently completed many new Diviners; she would earn much praise if the provided the blood to initiate them.
She followed the crowd through the fabric market, ignoring colorful silks and damasks, having no need for such extravagance anymore. Yet, out of habit, she glanced at the corner where her mother and aunts set up their stall. Empty. Summer was undeniably the best time to travel to the smaller huets without any merchants of their own, and she hadn’t really expected to see her kin. The summer journeys could mean the difference between profit and loss. Her kin could not speak to her first in any case, unless they visited the temple at the celebration of Dal’s Ascension, when the sun stood highest in the sky. No one from her kin had visited in the last two years and she did not expect them at this year’s ceremony, in three weeks’ time. Her family was the priesthood now.
She sniffed. Her kin might travel the roads between the towns of the Children of Dal, meeting new people and seeing new places, but she was the one who would please Dal and progress to the next life. So what if all she ever saw was the Ninth Sun market and the inside of the temple? She did her duty.
The crowd increased, though people gave way before her, shuffling back at seeing a priestess holding her Diviner sheathed in her belt. A gap opened, letting her discover the cause of the distraction: a brown man in brown clothing.
Santabe blinked even though she stood in shade. He had skin as brown as if he’d rubbed his flesh with mud. His eyes were of brown, too, cloudy like dirty puddles. Against all law, he let a brown and ratty beard cover his face from Dal. For clothing, he wore not a proper coat, but a long piece of cloth with a hole cut out of the center for his head. Stings of leather crisscrossed his feet, leaving his brown toes exposed like a savage’s. He sat upon the speaker platform reserved for priests and ate a piece of cheese.
For a minute, Santabe ground her teeth. This stranger had been many places that she couldn’t even imagine. Then she realized where he sat for his rude picnic.
Blasphemy.
The foreigner spoke and her anger grew as none of the Children of Dal shouted him down or turned away. His speech was broken and imperfect as a toddler but she could understand a word or two.
“. . . Strong people . . . much fight . . . wealth . . . rich for the taking . . .”
Foreigners were not exactly forbidden among the Children of Dal, but Dal did not welcome them. Sometimes scholars or politicians from other lands approached, seeking benefits or treaties, but the priests always sent them on their way unsatisfied. What did this man want here?
And why had Dal led her to be the first to discover him?
She elbowed her way past two slack-jawed soldiers in black and yellow and strode right up to the stranger, already with her Diviner free of her belt. “You!” Her eyes blazed. “Stand up! That is the speaker platform. It is not for you.” She yanked upon his arm in case he didn’t understand.
Her strength moved him not at all, though he looked entirely ordinary in size and build, and she had been trained to handle much larger opposition.
Instead, he regarded her from head to toe, his weird brown eyes expressing only confidence. Seemingly coming to some conclusion, he rose and pointed to the wooden platform, getting slowly to his feet and letting the foreign words slip slowly from his tongue. “Petitioners. Speak here. Law. I petition to learn of Dal.”
The people gasped and fled in earnest. Santabe’s anger went white-hot. Tricked. She was used. The man obviously picked this spot, knowing full well that to encounter a priest here gave him this advantage. No petitioner who asked to learn of Dal could be turned away or sent to the next life until the petitioner decided they had satisfied their curiosity about Dal. Who was this foreigner to manipulate their laws? And how had he known?
“Woodsmen,” she sputtered. “You spoke to the woodsmen outside of town.” It could be the only way this stranger could have known how to protect himself. They must have taught this man to speak their language as well. The woodsmen, who rarely saw a priest of Dal, had started to develop offensive attitudes along with their care of the trees. Priests didn’t want to bother to chase such a scant population through the hills and woods for days, only to see their prey slip away again and again. The woodsmen took pride in being difficult. They had informed this stranger how to circumvent the law.
“I would learn of Dal,” he repeated.
Her bottom lip jutted out. She would be considered a fool by her superiors for giving this man a chance to speak—and now she had no choice but to escort him to the temple with safe passage. “Then come.” She rammed her Diviner into her belt with extra force. This was not how her day was supposed to go.
He pointed to himself. “I Ordoño. And you?”
What kind of barbarian name is that?
The pleasant smile on his hairy face only increased her burn, but a petitioner asking to know Dal could not be refused on any question, except for the most sacred mysteries. Not that she had been taught those yet. She shoved her braid over her shoulder. She would give as little as possible. “Santabe.”
“You priestess of Dal?”
“Yes,” she bit out.
“You teach me?”
“No,” she said much too quickly. Her flesh creeped at the suggestion. His eyes looked at her the way a man looked at a woman, much too familiarly, and not the way people should look at a priestess: with fear. His eyes traveled over her tall body, lingering on the muscles of her arms and her long braid. “You go to the high priests. They’ll teach you.”
His smile strengthened at her denial. “I think you teach me Dal. I teach you speak my words. We be great friend. Children of Dal like me very much. I learn you ways. We change world.”
She forced a laugh at his insane words even as a shiver ran up her back, though Santabe could not say why. “And I think I’ll be the one to end your miserable life and send you to the next life.”
The Great Dal let that time be soon.