“No, of course not,” Kandah said. “That is never reliable. The lies men tell themselves are all recorded in the histories.”
“Alongside many truths,” Gishna croaked.
Kandah chuckled too loudly, and Gishna cringed.
“Explain what she must do,” she said.
He offered a small bow.
“You will have at your disposal, an army of seekers,” he said to Julissa, “who will go out into the valleys, the low houses, the forgotten bloodlines in the mines and lumber yards. And all the way to the frontiers… and beyond, if necessary.”
“The colonies?” Julissa asked. “Exiles?”
“Precisely,” he replied. “This army will bring me samples with as much history as can be learned after so long a time.”
“And?” Julissa blurted out the word and her aura, as weak as it was, quavered.
“I study the samples,” he said. “Then your scribes write the names upon the trees. Together, we identify their origins. We make recommendations to the high matron on pairings. What happens after is not my concern.”
“No,” Gishna said. “It is not. But it will be yours, Julissa.”
“I don't understand,” Julissa said.
“It is much to bear, but you will bear it,” Gishna said.
“I will be here to help,” Kandah said.
Gishna sensed tension in her daughter, and she understood. She still wanted to know how and why the man did what he did, locked up for so long in this chamber. What manner of life was that? Yet he did it, as if time didn't matter and with joy.
“My line has studied your people for many generations,” Kandah said. “I can't stop now.”
“He is modest again,” Gishna said. “He is of the valmasin. Before the Fall, they determined the fitness of a Mornae child to bear the name to which it was born.”
“A what?” Julissa blurted. Her voice strained, tears building with each utterance.
“Before the Fall, dearest,” Gishna explained, “Mornae houses cared for one thing: to gain greater access to the Dark. It was the reason our people came here. To seek perfection. Of mind, body, and power. If a child was born to me, I would take it to the valmasin council. They lived in the temple. There were more valmasin then. They peered into the child's nature. Each had his own gifts and talents. I could then decide which of the observations mattered most to my line. Whether beauty, mind, or strength. Most Mornae children had all three qualities, but sometimes… what did you call it?”
“A bad stitch, matron,” Kandah said, grinning.
“Yes, a bad stitch in the weave,” Gishna said. “A child might be born with only two, or sadly one quality. And sometimes, as if cursed, none of our qualities. So, during confinement, a matron judged whether the child was acceptable to her house. If not, they secreted the child to the temple for adoption into a lesser house. This is one reason for confinement. And Mornae never, ever mentioned a child's origins, even if they knew perfectly well where the child had come from. The valmasin always knew where the children went. For them, each of us is an open book, a living history. They know all the notes which make up our music.”
“How lovely, high matron,” Kandah said, his eyes narrowed. “I had not thought of it that way.” He smirked in his way, charming, but hideous to her. Treachery coiled behind those feline green eyes.
“After the Fall, it became difficult for the valmasin,” Gishna said. “Many were assassinated for fear of their knowledge being revealed.”
“What knowledge?” Julissa asked. She was angry now, and rightly so. The implications became clear.
“That you were unraveling,” he said, “as a people.”
Julissa straightened, imperious. “And not you?” she demanded.
Pride swelled in Gishna’s cantankerous chest. There was the future matron.
Kandah made a slight bow. “Ours is a different power.”
“But ours is the greatest, the power of the goddess!” Julissa said.
Kandah steepled his fingers below his chin. “Have you played the game with blocks?” he asked. “The fortress, I think you call it.”
Julissa shook her head and lifted her hands questioningly. She was furious. Gishna just listened. Best to let the strange, green-eyed man tell her everything and receive the brunt of her anger.
“If the base is weak, it all collapses,” he said. “No matter how great the towers and the heights. If the base crumbles…”
“The Fall?” Julissa asked. She was grasping now, searching her mind. Everything was there in their history if one had the key to unlock its meaning. It never lied, it was just couched in legend and metaphor.
“The power of your goddess is on the same axis as sayin,” he said. “When Saylassa turned to dust, the base fell out from under your people. Mornae are still fundamentally—”
“Inexorably,” Gishna interrupted.
“Yes,” he said. “Inexorably, Alcar. They are still your foundation.”
“But it's been cycles. Fifteen cycles!” Julissa exclaimed.
He shrugged.
“He's correct,” Gishna said. “We are a hybrid form.”
“To pursue the Dark requires a sturdy base on which to build,” he said. “Like a great eagle taking flight from a lofty mountain peak. But ask it to take off from the flat ground, and it must struggle to lift itself.”
