The Dragon's Tapestry

“Stuff,” she thought she heard him say. 

Chapter Thirteen

When light was put through the prism of matter, it became many things: spirit, love, knowledge ...

—

“The creation song” from Songs of the One Mother 

The wind was wild, the whole earth was breathing deeply, laughing and panting and singing, and the grasses, like earthfur, bent beneath the wind’s caress. Up sprang the little wind babies: stinging thinwings, fly­ing iyos and far-jumping jimmies, all doing their braidy dance with unseen curls of air. The clouds had furled into fans of white mist, and beyond them the sky was deep and wide. Marwen let her heart and her wingwand soar into them.

“Father,” she said aloud into the wind, for the first time believing it was true. She had always believed in the wizard, but now she no longer needed to believe, for she knew. And she also knew that the wizard Nimroth was not afraid of Perdoneg, for no one returns from the land of the dead, not even to do battle with dragons. But beyond this there was a deeper joy within her: Nimroth loved her, and he had come for her. She wished she could shout it to the world, to Maug. But Maug was too far away, and the world was too far below.

“Father,” she said aloud again. 

Chapter Fourteen

Evil has its own kingdom where a different penny is given in reward.

—Tenets of the Tapestry 

Camps of refugees had sprung up in the hills and valleys, ragged groups of men, women, and children who hovered around pale fires, their eyes and hands dragged down by dreams and fear, victims of the dragon’s violence. Among them, when she stopped to beg a lit­tle of their watery stew and hard bread, she first heard the rumors of the return of the wizard’s heir. They warmed their hearts and hands over this hope as over a fire, and Marwen lis­tened to them embarrassed, fearful, silent.

Marwen’s hair color alarmed many people, and she avoided them when she could, until she began to dream of warm bread and fresh cheese, soft blankets and hot baths. Then she would tell them her name, Marwen Oldwife, and she would be directed to the Oldwife of the community. There Marwen was sometimes able to obtain food and a place to rest in exchange for assistance in the tapestry making or in the soup making. Marwen enter­tained the Verduman Oldwives with Venutian tales of magic, but she made no spells but for the spells of hiding. The Oldwives themselves were almost as skeptical as their people. They viewed the tapestries they created with an even temper, never amazed or disappointed because they did not believe in their truth. Once Marwen saw the tapestry judged at a death with much wresting of interpretation, and with a limited and earthly understanding of the symbols. But the further north and inland Marwen traveled, and the closer she came to Perdoneg, the less cynical the Oldwives became. At last, one day Marwen arrived on the outskirts of Rute, a land of long gulches and hollows and thick grazing grasses. Mothball was growing sleek, but Cudgham-ip was sleepier than ever, and his scaly skin hung on him, wrinkled and old. She eyed wearily dark storm clouds to the north. Asking at the east window of the first house for the Oldwife, Marwen heard a voice call out, “I am she. Have you not been taught the summoning?”

“Oldwife of Rute, let your hands be blessed,” Marwen said smiling to herself. “A sister desires rest and repast if it is in your power to give.”

As she spoke, a woman emerged from the shadows. She was probably about ten suns older than Marwen, but she, too, wore the knee-length braid of a virgin. Her hair and eyes were black as winterdark, her skin a warm dark brown.

“You are a sister?” the girl said. “Let me see your tapestry.” She did not mean the whole tapestry, she meant only the corner in which was inscribed the calling. Marwen thought this through rationally, calmly, while her stomach squeezed into a tight painful ball.

“This is the first time I have been asked while traveling in your land these many days,” Marwen said, and she tried to smile. It felt more like a grimace.

“Well, but I am a true believer,” the dark woman said, “and these are evil times.” Her accent was lilting, making each word sound new in Marwen’s ears.

“I, also, am a believer,” Marwen said, “but I have no tapestry.” She could not believe she had uttered those words, and she listened carefully to the silence into which they fell.

The dark woman’s face did not change.

After a moment Marwen felt she could not bear the silence, that she must fill it up with words and explanations and excuses. The wind pushed at her back. She felt her face twist a little, and she cleared her voice so that it might sound sensible and mature.