The Ivory Merchants

Chapter Ten: Listening to silence

Two days. Edmund woke, on his first morning in Reznar's village, more than ever determined to wait no longer than the two days of Hoom's absence before resuming his journey to find and free the lost Calves of the Nhaarh. The dumb elephants who worked the capstans, or the ferries, who had plodded forward, solid and unresponsive as the steamrollers he dimly remembered—it seemed that he must accept that they were truly Telmarine elephants. But the timber-hauling elephants—they had been seen by the Ravens showing compassion one for another, which was surely a sign that they thought and felt, and could be—must be!— Narnian Elephants. True, as Nem had hinted about the ferry-slaves, not speaking did not necessarily mean unable to speak—even, he felt uneasily, unable to speak did not mean unable to think or to feel. But he had seen nothing of either thought or feeling, and for the time he must concentrate on those Beasts he had not yet seen, to try all in his power to search out the lost Calves, so that he could persuade the Nhaarh to find safety away from these hunters, before they resumed their hunt.

He could begin in two days. Meanwhile, he had set himself the task of using that time to learn all he could about this strange people who lived atop the Wall, and who, it seemed, had devised ways to descend it. The capstan near the cliff-edge—so hurriedly dismantled, and the slave-elephants taken away inland, so carefully not mentioned, while the king and his escort had climbed painfully with ropes and slings—that was plainly enough designed to lower men and supplies into Narnia. Telmar was friendly to Narnia now, and even petitioners in the matter of the trade-road, but Edmund had been king long enough, now, to realise that a nation devising a secret way to cross a border could not be left unwatched. Therefore—he would spend these two days finding everything he could about these people.

The household was already stirring; Edmund sat up and looked about him. Reznar's place lay empty, but other young men, and older men, were about, some still just rising from sleeping-corners like his own, but others apparently readying for the unknown business of their day. He could hear children, too, and an indistinct bustle not unlike a dwarf-holt beginning the day. This great house must hold more families than one, it seemed; in that it was more like a little castle, or keep. Who ruled here, he wondered? Reznar?

He rose and pulled on his breeks, tucking in his shirt and running his fingers through his hair, as the quickest way to maybe seem presentable, before he went to see what ways there were here to make himself clean for the new day. He was just turning out into the larger central space of the hall when he became aware that one of the men, an older man, a dark man, and stocky rather than tall, was standing in the shadow of the next sleeping-nook, and was watching him silently.

"Met, Highness." The words came jerkily, as if this were one unused to speech, or to graciousness.

Dark, stocky... and familiar-seeming. A man of few words, standing back... Edmund's mind flashed to a scene, many months back, to the first tentative visit of the ivory traders to Cair Paravel, to a man who had stood behind the Telmarine spokesman, Hoom. The silent, watchful brother...

With an effort Edmund reached into his memory and fetched out the man's name.

"Well met, Gul. You see that I have come as we bargained, to travel through your land."

Gul nodded, and then slightly tilted his head towards the front of the hall, as if in invitation for Edmund to walk in that direction.

It was the way he had been proposing to go, it was the way to the place where they had eaten the night before, and presumably the way to find water to wash; nevertheless, the king felt a ripple of unease that he was being guided into the path this man wanted him to take, and not allowed to wander freely in the great house. But if so, it was not the time to let his hosts know that he saw through their manoeuvrings—and in any case, he wanted breakfast.

o-o-o-o-o

The hard scraping of the rock was suddenly gone. Kirrina's grasp loosened, stroked gently along Lucy's forearm in a final caress, and let go. For just a moment Lucy felt as if she was falling into nothingness, felt the clench of fear on her. It felt odd, unsafe, to be separate again, after travelling so far, held so tight.

"You are in air again, Queen. Open your eyes."

Lucy opened her eyes, cautiously, and then clenched them tight-closed again, against the piercing brightness of this daylight world.

"Queen? Open your eyes."

Lucy shook her head, and stood for a moment or two longer, breathing the freshness, and gradually learning to feel again the meaning of sun on her skin. Sun, but cool sun, morning sun, she decided, and the air dry but somehow clear, and yet different from Cair Paravel air, and curiously blank, despite the sharp, sweet sound of birdcalls, without the constant background shhh-shhh of the sea. Even before opening her eyes she could feel it; they were on top of the Wall.

They were standing on rocky, damp ground, not far from a belt of low, scrubby trees. She swung around, exhilarated, and looked back to the east, to the laughing morning sun, and then left and right, eagerly.

"We did it! Kirrina, you did it! Are they far away? The Elephants—are they here?" Then back again to peer into the shadows of the trees, "Are they in the forest?"

"We will find them! You will find them, Queen."

Lucy paused, distracted. "You called me Queen. You never call me Queen!"

Kirrina laughed, and span around, her arms spread wide. "You did so well! Not everyone can travel my ways and the rock way with such courage. Not since the Winter first gripped Narnia have I tried to bring any this way. You are becoming a great and valiant queen indeed, and so I will call you!"

"You brought me. You're the one helping me to find the Elephants and bring them back to Narnia."

Kirrina stopped short in her twirling, grave again in an instant.

"To bring them to Narnia... do not ask that of me, Queen. "

"You... you won't help bring them back to Narnia? That's the whole reason we're here!" The words began as a gasp of astonishment, and ended as an accusing wail.

"I cannot promise that. To find them, I will help you in that if I can. And for that you will need to listen, not speak bitterness."

"But you won't help to bring them..."

Lucy's eyes were wide with the beginning of anger. Kirrina paused, as if to consider; her expression was unreadable.

"Queen... do you know my name?

"Yes. Part of it." Lucy's voice was choked with resentment.

"Then you know that I have trusted you."

"Yes. Partly."

A small smile tugged at Kirrina's lips.

"Then trust me, Queen. Believe me, it is time to listen, and not speak, if you would find your people."

It was still a struggle, but Lucy swallowed, and achieved victory enough to say, if a fraction resentfully still, "Listen what to? I can't hear anything."

"No. You need to learn to hear. Come away up near the trees; it will be easier for us both near the trees." And she led the way to softer, higher ground.

"I'm listening," said Lucy. She craned her neck, as if greater height could bring the sound of Elephants.

Kirrina laughed, softly.

"You need not stand so tall, Queen! You will need to hear with your whole body. Think here." She pressed her hand flat, a little above Lucy's middle. "Here, and through your whole body. Kneel down now and spread out your hands, flat against the earth. Close your eyes again, and hear with your body as well as your ears, inside your ears... Good. Listen, like that, and maybe you will hear..."

Kirrina's voice faded, and Lucy knew without looking that she had gone. Well... trust. Lucy waited, with her eyes obediently closed. It felt almost like a game, but... she squeezed her eyes shut, and listened. Nothing. Just the birds, calling, and... but no, birdsong was a sound coming into her outside ear—inside your ears, Kirrina had said, and with your whole body. She tried again, hands spread wide, listening and thinking, body, body, body...

Something ...she couldn't hear it, but it was there. Her eyes flew open. She had heard something—heard it or felt it, she couldn't say which. A wave rolling through her, or a low, low rumble... Her eyes flew open.

"Kirrina!"

And Kirrina was there, sprung from nowhere, and bright with triumph.

"You heard? You felt it?"

"Yes! Something. Was it the Elephants? It made me think of thunder, or... it was a bit like Murmuring Valley..."

"It was not the Elephants. But you are learning to hear, Daughter of Eve! Ah, bright air above the ground! See how this River has come from her hidden places, and teaches the Daughter of Eve!"

Lucy smiled, puzzled, but hopeful again. It was so hard to know, with Kirrina, what things would suddenly see her brimful with joy, or what would make her angry, or how she thought about anything. Still, this wild delight surely showed that they were making progress? And if she could once find the Elephants, from there it would be easy, with or without Kirrina's help.

"So can I hear the Elephants now? Can we find them?"

"Not yet. Not yet. You have not heard Elephants yet. Close your eyes, and listen again. It will be softer this time, farther away. But Queen, truly, by the time the sun is high, I think you will be ready to hear them indeed. Close your eyes again."

Lucy closed her eyes.

o-o-o-o-o

Gul stayed in sight or rather, Edmund supposed, kept the visiting king in sight until he had found Mavram and Izrah near the kitchens, and been taken to the water-butt and earth-closets alongside the hall. The sisters were much amused there, beside the high timber walls, to see the exercises which, he assured them he did every morning, and most nights. He chatted to them as he stretched, bent, and twisted, vigorously, in a constant stream of cheerful, enjoyable nothings to fill the air with their laughing; they did not even notice the Bird which sat silent and watching at the side-point of the high roof, and then as silently glided away again, easterly.

The older man rejoined them over breakfast, sitting a little behind Edmund and across from the two girls. He said nothing, but Edmund understood: his conversation, no less than his movements, was under close scrutiny.

He was careful, therefore, to begin by talking of matters which surely were indifferent, and not likely to raise a suspicion that he was gathering intelligence as well as seeking the Elephants. He spoke cheerfully of the breakfast provided—a thin nutty gruel, with honey alongside to sweeten it—and listened smiling to Izrah's meandering, self-important explanation of how she had helped to toast and grind the seeds for it, and what her mother had said about the honey. As she began to grow more rambling in her talk, he looked to the older sister, and then glanced up at the rafters, criss-crossing the dark emptiness overhead.

"This house is a wonder to me. Your brother did not prepare me for such grandeur."

Mavram looked at him cautiously, as if to check that he was not mocking; Izrah, though, sat up eagerly, as if ready to expatiate on the glories of the house.

"My father built it! He was the cleverest builder ever, because when he was only our age, he found out how..."

Her father? Then also Reznar's and Mavram's father, and Hurrdah's husband. He was suddenly very curious about this unseen man, who built with such grandeur, but whose name had never yet been mentioned. Dead, perhaps? or gone a journey, like Hoom?

"Your father and your mother both, Izrah!" Mavram was saying, in rebuking, silencing tone. "Both women and men provide for the followers."

The little girl wriggled, in mixed acknowledgement and impatience. "I know... it's in the story...

The followers, Edmund noted, and recalled Izrah's indignant claim the night before: Reznar is a leader! Was that claim based on providing for followers?

"How does building a house provide for followers?" he asked, and hoped the question seemed like an idle curiosity.

"Not the building alone, king," Mavram replied, "you have seen yourself how many men may sleep here, and are fed. But the building, too, gives many the feasting which in the old days..."

There was no sound from behind, but Mavram's eyes flicked, behind and then back to Edmund. She paused for just a heartbeat, and then began to speak rapidly, a little nervously. "But it is ill to talk of old feasts when we have this good breakfast before us, freshly made by my mother."

Edmund understood well enough. There had been a sign, a gesture, and Mavram had been warned away from talk of old feasts. Good. He did not want to talk of such, himself; he thought he was beginning to realise all too plainly what those feasts had been, and was sickened at the thought.

But it was his part to seem as unconscious of what had happened as little Izrah, who had been toying with the spoon in the honey-dish, and seen nothing. He forced himself to seem to want to eat more, and smiled in reply to Mavram's gambit.

"She has made this good breakfast, and also made the house we eat in! So women also work to build houses, then? I had thought that men and women worked separately in Telmar."

Mavram's gaze shifted again, past him to Gul; she spoke a little defiantly. "In old days we did. But times change."

Times change? Edmund wondered. And was this something that Gul resisted?

"And with the changing times, women begin to build houses?" he probed, carefully not looking at either sister, and seeming occupied in stirring his gruel.

There was a squeal of hilarity from Izrah—and a curious short grunt from behind him.

He looked up, perplexed. One sister was bubbling with amusement; the other seemed suddenly furious.

"Have I offended, Mistress? You said that women had begun to build houses..."

"We always have done!" She spoke with energy, but also anger—and not for him only. Though she kept her eyes squarely on the king now, something in the tilt of her head, and the way she pitched her voice told him that she was addressing Gul as well.

"Us women showed the men how!" put in Izrah, proudly.

"Always have made the houses? Then what has changed?"

Mavram sat up very straight. Speaking clearly, as if to someone slow of understanding, she asked him, "What make our houses, king?"

"Who...?"

"Of what do we make our houses, Eastern king?"

Of course. Trees. Plants were women's business, and wooden houses, therefore...

"Trees. Plants. I see now why it is women's business. But how do you... "

From behind, Gul's voice, heavily. "Only plants."

Mavram took one or two angry breaths, then, apparently baffled, nodded in acquiescence.

"Yes. Only with plants."

"No burnt limestone? or clay, or stone, not even to hold these pillars? Or iron to hold down..."

"No. Only plants." She seemed to have recovered somewhat from the unspoken tussle with Gul. "We shape the trees, and fit them together, and tree-rope binds the roof, and the wisemother brews from the forest-blood, and spreads where the trees join, which holds them..." She gestured with her hands: firm, rigid, solid.

Edmund drew a deep breath. This was truly an amazing architecture. These were truly an amazing people.

Gul rose to his feet.

"No more now."

Of food or talk, Edmund wondered? But Gul was apparently leaving. He looked directly and heavily at Mavram as he turned to go.

"Old ways left no debts."

Izrah scrambled to her feet; Mavram, her lips thin and her eyes stormy, leaned forward and began to gather together the few simple dishes. Breakfast was clearly over.

Edmund watched in silence. Whatever that meant, old ways leave no debts, it seemed well understood, and resented, by Mavram. But his business here was not to untangle local quarrels, but first to ensure the safety of any Elephants in this land, and secondly to gather what information he could for the safety of all Narnia.

He set his mind to sorting through what fragments of information he had already, trying to piece them together into one whole picture.

Leadership came from provision for followers. In the old way, through the slaughter of Elephants, for tusks and... he tried not to see the scenes his mind insistently pushed at him... meat. The feasts which had once bound leaders and followers together followed the ruthless slaughter of thinking, feeling Narnians. But the new way—had Mavram's father been a pioneer of this? In the new way, when the trade route had been blocked, and the hunts forbidden, they had found a value in knowledge of forest-lore, and men had made names by using women's knowledge in house-building; then feasts had been at the roof-raising, not at slaughter. And Telmar was in flux, shifting between the two, a struggle which he thought showed even in the squabble, the night before, between Mavram and her brother about whether men or women should control the timber-hauling Elephants.

But if this unknown Capun died, might there not be two struggles in Telmar? The struggle between the old ways and the new, and a struggle for leadership. And if so, what might that mean for Narnia? Or what might his own actions mean for Telmar?

Reznar is a leader, the ardent little sister had said, but he doubted very much that Reznar, despite his great house, could really contend for leadership. The journey overland had shown him always a follower, subordinate to Hoom. His father, perhaps, had been positioning himself for such a thing, but... he must find out about the father. In the meantime—Hoom's departure showed certainly that he was jockeying for power as the old leader died. Jockeying for power, and wanting to use Edmund himself, and the Narnian connection, as tools in his bid. And it was an odd alliance, surely, between Hoom, holding to the old ways, and this family, which despite Mavram's indignation at his blundering dismissal of women's history of house-building by women, held to the new?

Mavram's broke into his thoughts. "Will you move, king? These mats need to be..."

"Of course."

He followed her out onto the balcony, and waited while she shook the mats vigorously, one after the other, marshalling his thoughts, and his words. Now, while they were alone, before she went back inside...

"Mavram, wait."

She turned from had been spreading the mats along the balustrade, in the warm sun. He spoke, quietly, hurriedly.

"Forgive me, Mistress. I do not mean to give you pain, but I want not to speak amiss, either to your mother or to Izrah. Is your father yet alive?"

No. He saw from the pain which leapt to her eyes, that her father was indeed dead. But more than pain, he noted; her face showed anger as well, not for him, but about the death. Whatever had happened, this was a death which was felt by this proud daughter as unjust.

"No. He is not."

Her sorrow... whatever had happened, her sorrow woke his compassion. He reached to touch her arm.

"The breath of Aslan..." But she did not know Aslan. He tried again. "Comfort be with you, and with this house, Mistress."

"Thank you," she said, almost curtly, and went back into the dark inside.

He stayed, leaning on the sturdy balustrade, one hand half-unconsciously tracing the heavy carving on the outer edge, as he thought what it all might mean. An unjust death, perhaps, of a leader in Telmar. And conflict, or conflict brewing, close to Narnia.

Times change. Times change, and houses which once had been built by women only were now built by men and Elephants as well. And: men build higher now than they did once, my grandmother says, Mavram had said, over supper. That meant men had been building for some decades, surely? But not so long that the "old ways" had been completely forgotten—and the houses had been growing taller and greater since then? Why? And the houses had grown higher over the time that men had been part of the building—and men dealt with animals. A work fit for Men, Reznar had said, but also, the elephants work for us there, too... the roof-raising.

He drew a deep breath. Elephants, and the roof-raising! No matter what knowledge the women had had, this great roof could not have been raised by human power alone, with this scanty population. But Elephants... the pieces of information all seemed to come together of their own accord, now.

Izrah's father—the cleverest builder ever, she had said, only to be silenced and diverted by her sister's admonition to remember the role women had played. And Izrah had been diverted, as he himself had been, he realised, silenced from any talk of what had been the discoveries and achievements of the cleverest builder ever, in that era of greater and greater houses. Was it not, surely, that her father had been the one who had discovered the way to harness the hauling power of Elephants?—maybe not the first simple use of ropes slung over tree-limbs, but more probably had found how to multiply that power many times with capstans, to winch up these huge timbers, had perhaps discovered ratcheting, too, and the use of counter-weights...

They had tried to hide one capstan from him at the cliff-edge; but that use, for descending the cliff, plainly was a use developed after the Winter, an offshoot of what had been developed here, for building. Developed for building, as part of the way Telmarines struggled for status and power among themselves, yes, but more recently, some other intelligence—Hoom? Gul?—had seen how it could be used to enter Narnia. Whoever controlled this secret, controlled the trade route into Narnia. And by simple suppression of talk, they had hidden in silence the advances in technology—suppression not just of Izrah's naive boast, but also, he now saw, of his own questions about the methods of the house-building.

How..., he asked, and Only plants, Gul had said, and Mavram had picked up the warning, and talked only of materials, not of methods, and he himself had not even seen how he was being steered away from what they did not want him to hear. The old error, to not hear what was not said. It was an error, he resolved, that he would not make again.

o-o-o-o-o

It was hard work, listening—pressing against the earth and straining to catch the low, light fluttering, neither sound nor not-sound, the uneasy sense that there was a call, a ripple in the world, just beyond her perception...

The morning wore away. The ripples grew fainter, harder and harder to catch. Lucy pressed her lips tight and listened.

Kirrina's voice dropped to a whisper, a breath. "Do you hear, Queen?"

Each time, a pause to be certain, and then... "Yes."

And fainter still, until—

"Drink, Queen."

Kirrina was kneeling beside her, offering water in her two cupped hands.

"You have worked hard, and your people need you to stay well."

Yes, she was tired. She drank thirstily, and felt the better for the draught.

"I can't stop, though, Kirrina. I need to learn to hear the Elephants. I know which direction to go, sort of, but..."

"No." Kirrina 's dark eyes were intent. "You have learnt now all I can teach. I have stilled the waters; now it is for you to listen again. This time you listen for the Elephants indeed. Listen deep, for the cries of your people will be very faint."

Lucy closed her eyes, pressed again to the earth, and concentrated.

Nothing... nothing?

Or... something so faint, so lost and swallowed up... She looked miserably at Kirrina.

"I can't... "

"Shhh..." Kirrina's lively face had become still and stern as stone. With her eyes, not with her voice, she commanded "Listen!"

And again... with her whole body, to try to find again through the clamour of forest-noise that faint, wavering movement of sound-but-not-sound...

and there was...

Her eyes flew open, and she stared at Kirrina, not daring to believe that what she had felt was what she had come so far to find.

But that... how could she not have heard it? She closed her eyes again, sat up, cross-legged, and listened. Faint, wavering, but unmistakeable... like a thread to be followed, and never lost.

So—from here the path was clear. She scrambled to her feet. She had been brought this far, and from here it was up to her. She took a deep breath, wriggled her shoulders to feel on them the small, steady weight of her cordial and her dagger, and checked once to see that she had the Dwarven-work still with her. Up to her now.

"I can hear them! So I have to go now." Her whole body was tensed, wound tight as an arbalest set to fire. "You were wonderful, and you've helped me a lot. Thank you very much for bringing me here."

Kirrina's grave, watchful face was suddenly alive with quick, sharp-eyed laughter.

"Does the Queen dismiss the River, now she has no more need of her, then?"

"Oh, no! No! But you said you wouldn't help with the next bit, to bring them back to Narnia. And you've helped me with what you said..."

"I may do more yet, before we are through. But for now, valiant Queen, I will follow where you lead."

Some of the tension drained from Lucy's figure. She gave a quick smile, swung about and the two set off, southward, along the forest edge.

o-o-o-o-o

o-o-o

A/N: Welcome back, kind and patient readers! :) I really hope that my next update won't loiter as long in the offing! And I would very much welcome feedback and criticism of this chapter, as I try to get the writing back on track.