Our Little Gods 1: RABATEA, the first World of the Daughters.

Chapter 9.

Later that evening, as the mists from the sea creeped up the streets of the white city, a man walked alone, hunched as if the weight of the world was on his shoulders. Ael is a flat city, none of its building short of a couple temples have upper stories. The streets are made up of small houses with near to flat roofs, the thing is, the waters around are rather shallow so even in winter they tend to be warmer than the cold air coming from from the cold lands upward. Living in the archipelago is a mild affaire, never truly cold, it seldom rains and the mists of winter and early spring never last much past day break. The man stopped at the low wall enclosing a little cottage. The small garden had been trimmed recently and the vine that had been planted to climb above the door was budding with sharp green blossom promising the shade of foliage and truss of fruits both tart and sweet during summer. But night was already there and the buds looked dark and forbidding. He pushed the little gate and walked in the garden to the door. There was no latch or lock on it as is the rule for most buildings but the temples on the island. Limero pushed the door open and the weathered wood panels gave a familiar groan before allowing him back home. One of the added bonus of living in Ael were the hot springs that had been channeled in clay pipes running the length and breath of the city in the ground and under each and every house and cottage. Even the larger temples were heated that way. Limero walked to the corner and turned a copper lever to allow the warm waters to run under the tiled floor of his study. He pulled his flint string and taper and set about illuminating two little oil lamps. As he brought the small flame to the baked clay vessel he noticed the wick had been changed to a new one and as the light grew stronger he saw that the place was tidy and neat. Probably tidier than when he had left it four years ago. Weary, he sat in the chair by the desk and remained sitting there, motionless his face inscrutable.

She walked inside the cottage as if it was hers and closed the door behind herself before taking off the shall she had used to protect her hair from the damp of the mist. She looked upon him in silence and he looked back. He started to smile and reached out in a both tender and supplicating gesture his hands outstretched towards her in an attempt at bridging the gap between them that had been created by the room and his travels. Smiling back Efiel walked to him and took hold of his head pressing his face on her belly. He needed nothing more to break. The silent tears that first came were quickly replaced with loud sobbing and uncontrollable crying.

"What is it my love." She murmured while caressing his greying hair.

"I failed... all these years, the patient planning. Lying to the sweet boys and their kind parents... All for nothing. Four years alone in the cold miserable moors of the Limorean Marks and I was too late, I could have been wrong, it could have been any of the others. They hate me now, I could tell. Farenn would feed me to a fast-runner if he could..."

She let him talk, she felt how much he needed to.

"... Even Maasil, he is the brightest you know. That kid, brighter than me. So much promises, so much hope. But I saw it in his eyes. The disappointment at the deception... I know, I feel it too. For nothing. all this for nothing."

The tears flowed now in silence, she crouched in front of him and looked in his bloodshot eyes.

"There is fresh verbena in the jar by the stove and fresh water in the tank, would you be so kind to kindle the stove? I believe we both could do with some warmth inside our bodies." Her voice was warm and caring but the authority it carried was also undeniable.

He wiped his face best as he could and fumbled around for his flint and tapers.

"You know from my letters that I have been elected to the Council of Eight. There are many things concerning the wanderer that are not known even to monks of your capacity my dear." she said.

"What do you mean? I thought I was the principal recipient of the informations pertaining the wanderer when I took on the task of finding the children and protecting them."

"You were the recipient to what concerned the question of the children. How many trios in total?"

"Nine," He answered. "Nine time three."

"That we saved and brought to him. How many we know of that were lost before we could get to them?"

"Five time three, but is that why I wasn't told?"

"Yes, my sweet. I discovered that, when I begin to sit at the council. There were murders even here, in the archipelago: monks, acolytes even novices. And the Ignaien expeditions, three times forty people, mules and chariots and nothing came back but a besotted fool no one can make any sense of. Don't you think we were right to be cautious?"

"Yes, I suppose so." Limero took a ladle and lifted the lid of a large pottery half buried in the ground and filled a tureen with water. He placed it on the happily crackling stove and turned to face Efiel.

"Thank you for coming to me. I needed you." He said to her. "And for tending to the house and the garden."

"You noticed? I was certain you wouldn't be able to tell it had been me." She laughed.

"I could sense your presence even from the street." he lied. "What is it that I should know, then?"

"Well, it is complicated. You remember that when he first was brought here, the wanderer spoke a language none of us understood."

"Indeed. It was surmised at first to be some Parotosian dialect from Gash. But I guess that is impossible since he probably never set foot in Gash, didn't he?"

"Technically he never set foot anywhere since his feet had been crushed during his catastrophic arrival in Feroll."

"Do we trust the story that he sailed across the void between stars to help us in our fight?"

"We do." She said and placed a hand on his arm before adding. "The language he spoke initially was GodWord."