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A slight smile curved Sehaye’s lips as he wended his way through the rubble-strewn interior streets of Khambawe. The dissidents’ meeting had ended, and his ideas had received much attention, even from the cautious Jass Kebessa. Almost without thinking, Sehaye avoided the broken stones and other debris that littered his path as he savored the outcome of the gathering. In another part of his mind, he wondered if he would soon help to remove the wreckage past which he was now stepping, rubble he had, in his way, helped to create.
In the time before Sehaye’s countrymen had launched Retribution Time, the street he travelled had been free from detritus. But it had not been free of tsotsis, who had awaited in the shadows, poised to pounce on the unlucky and unwary who came within their reach. Now, the tsotsis were penned in the Maim, and were steadily disappearing. The only danger the street now posed for Sehaye was the chance of stumbling over some unnoticed obstacle.
Sehaye’s smile broadened as he left the interior of the city behind and approached the dwelling he had appropriated in the aftermath of Retribution Time’s failure. It was a modest house that had escaped the brunt of the destruction on the night of the invasion. Its previous owners had been killed, and no one else had come forth to claim it. Close to the area in which the dissidents met, although they never gathered in the same place twice in a row, as well as the other still-damaged areas in which he made his living, the location was ideal for Sehaye’s purposes.
And he had finally found a purpose after a period of aimlessness, and at times madness, that had lasted until the time immediately following Jass Gebrem’s coronation as Emperor. It was a gap he barely remembered, and he knew he was fortunate to have lived through it.
Even before the coronation, he could no longer maintain his previous identity as a fisherman. His boat had long since been lost. And after he had looked at the harbor the day after Retribution Time ended, and he had seen the spider-scarred corpses of his countrymen covering the surface of the water so thickly that he could have walked across them, he could no longer bear the sight of the sea.
Despite his wiry frame, Sehaye’s back was strong. Soon enough, he was able to stave off starvation by helping to clear the rubble left from Retribution Time, and participating in the rebuilding of the city he had dedicated his life to bringing down. The irony of his position did not escape him, and there were times when he teetered on the brink of an abyss of despair.
Then, one day, a voice that came from within pulled him away from that brink. He was certain that the voice belonged to Legaba. Sometimes, though, he thought it might belong to a different source, one that he did not care to contemplate very long or very deeply ...
Why I make questions? he asked himself.
Voice helping I, he assured himself in the Uloan dialect he spoke only in the deepest recesses of his mind.
I and I listen and learn, he promised himself.
Sehaye became known as a silent but capable worker who did what he was told without asking any questions. Following the advice of his new inner companion, he watched and listened as he worked. At first, he was searching, as always, for fellow spies from the Islands who might have survived Retribution Time. But even if any such people existed, he had no way of recognizing them. Jass Imbiah had forbidden any contact among her mainland spies; if they became acquainted, they could inadvertently give each other away. After a while, though, he gave up that search. If he were to be the only Uloan left in Khambawe, so be it.
Where Jass Imbiah gone? he often asked himself bitterly. Why she leave we? That the ruler of all the Islands was dead, he had no doubt, even though he had not personally witnessed her demise. And he also knew he had no way of ever returning to his homeland. Even if he did, he would likely be killed as a damned blankskin before he could open his mouth to convince his fellow Uloans that he was one of them despite his lack of spider-scars.
Sehaye had listened more closely as he heaved rocks and repositioned beams. And he began to hear mutterings of discontent; the voices of those who did not accept the huge changes that had occurred in Khambawe and spread throughout the Matile Mala Empire, even though the catalysts of those changes, the Almovaads, had saved the dissenters’ lives as well as those of the Believers.
And those were the voices the new speaker inside Sehaye’s head wanted him to hear ...
Sehaye continued to listen as he worked. Then he began to speak ... softly, unobtrusively, using the words that the voice inside him suggested. At first, the dissidents were surprised that their taciturn co-worker possessed the ability to utter more than two words at a time. However, the more they listened to him, the more respect they developed for what he said.
Soon enough, the dissidents invited Sehaye to one of their gatherings. Although he remained relatively quiet, when he did speak, his words were well-received. He quickly became accepted among the dissidents’ thin ranks. They entrusted him with their secrets because they were confident his mouth would stay as closed outside their meetings as it usually did during them.
At times, Sehaye wondered why the voice inside him harbored any interest at all in the dissidents. During their gatherings, they did little other than complain incessantly about the dominance of the newcomers; the changes the new religion had wrought; and the possible perils of the Almovaar magic, which was in many ways even more powerful than the ashuma the Amiyas had wielded in the legendary past. They also grumbled about Kyroun’s near-equality of power with that of Gebrem.
They even criticized the new fashions that were sweeping the younger people: the hair-dyeing to emulate the Fidis; the adoption of Fidi clothing, the intrusion of some of the foreigners’ words into the Matiles’ speech. Sehaye had rapidly grown weary of such useless talk, but the voice inside had persuaded him to continue to attend the dissidents’ gatherings.
Recently, though, the dissidents’ discussions had become more urgent. Rumors were spreading of a new war to come, to be launched by the Matile against the Thabas who were encroaching on the southern frontier.
Considering the near-annihilation the Matile had almost experienced when the Uloans invaded, the dissidents believed they were not alone in their trepidations about going into battle again so soon. The city was still recovering from the devastation the islanders had wrought. And there was even now another action being taken against the Uloans, on their home islands. Ships had departed the harbor, but no one knew what their ultimate intent would be once they reached their destination. The new authorities had remained silent about their purpose.
Sehaye had said nothing when the discussion touched on the islands. He needed to exert all the power of his will to prevent himself from attacking the Matile when they spoke of their satisfaction with the debacle his people had suffered. However, he did take satisfaction in the knowledge that the after-effects of Retribution Time would continue for a long time to come as the Matile rebuilt their city ... and his own schemes came closer to fruition.
Patience, Sehaye, the voice counselled. Patience ...
And so Sehaye continued to cultivate his ties with the dissidents, who continued to be satisfied with talk, not action.
Then, on this very night, the voice planted its final seed of suggestion in Sehaye’s mind. The islander’s eyes widened when the whispered words first welled within him. He wondered if madness had once again claimed him, as it had in the days that immediately followed the demise of Retribution Time. However, the more he listened, the more he realized that the voice was speaking the truth, and if he could persuade the others to accept the voice’s proposal, Retribution Time would be, in a small but not insignificant way, fulfilled after all.
That thought caused Sehaye’s smile to broaden as he reached his dwelling and went inside.