Chapter 100: The Vote

Mary sharpened eleven pencils before noon.

She did it at the end of the long table in the Westmere hall, with a little folding knife Grandpa had given her a long time ago, and she lined them up beside the black Council book in a row, points all facing the same way, like soldiers. Then she opened the book to a clean page and wrote the date at the top and underlined it twice.

"Eleven?" I said.

"One for every hundred names," said Mary, "and one to throw at Thor."

"There aren't eleven hundred."

"There are a hundred and forty-three," said Mary. "I counted last night. Pencils go blunt. And Thor will need throwing at." She looked at me over her reading glasses, the ones she pretends not to need. "Go and sit down, Garrick. You're making the room nervous."

I was. I could feel it. I went and sat down.

* * *

It was a bright day. The first really bright one since Selvane came ashore. The sea was blue instead of gray, and the rope awnings over the windows threw striped shadows across the long table, and outside, the whole of Westmere had turned out again, on the wall and the net-loft roofs and the masts, because word had gone around that today was the day.

Pim was on Wil's shoulders again, with Morning's lantern in her lap. He'd asked to watch from outside, with her. He said the hall was too bright for him with all those gods in it. I think he just liked the pie dish.

* * *

Aurelia stood up at noon.

She didn't make a speech. She'd said, the night before, that there had been enough speeches to last the Accord a century, and she wasn't going to add to the pile.

"There are three questions," she said. "I'll ask them one at a time. Every chair answers. Every crate that wants to. You stand, you say your name, you say aye or nay or that you'd rather not say. Nobody explains. Nobody argues. There's been time for that." She glanced at Thor. "Nobody throws anything."

"Mary's got pencils," said Thor.

"Mary may throw pencils," said Aurelia. "Nobody else."

* * *

"The first question," said Aurelia. "Sanctuary."

She laid it out plainly. Harbor-right, the old law of the Westmere coast, made the law of the whole Accord. Any god who came out of Kethra, stripped or held or running, and asked, would be given a place. Any person, too. Any child with a brand on its wrist. Any purser who'd taken Kethran gold and wanted to give it back. Every domain of the Accord, every river and hill and hearth and crossroads, would be a harbor to them, if they asked.

"That's all," said Aurelia. "It doesn't send anyone anywhere. It only opens a door." She looked at Vaust. "From the inside."

Vaust inclined his head.

"Brannoc," said Aurelia.

* * *

Brannoc stood up. Slowly, the way he does everything, as if his chair were a wall he was reluctant to leave unattended.

"Brannoc," he said. "Shields. The hold." He looked at the slip on the chair behind him, Widow Mabry, by the fish market, as if for confirmation. "Aye."

He sat down.

Mary wrote it. Brannoc. Aye.

"Corra," said Aurelia.

"Corra. Autumn." A leaf fell out of her hair as she stood. "Aye."

"Damar."

Damar stood up out of both his chairs at once, very carefully, so as not to take the table with him. "Damar," he said, in his voice like rocks settling. "Earth. Stone." He thought about it. He always thinks about things. "Aye."

* * *

It went on like that. All the way down the long table.

Faelan. Rivers. Aye. He wrote it in his own ledger at the same time Mary wrote it in hers, and they looked at each other across the table and nodded, like two clerks agreeing on a sum.

Lorn. The Varrow. Aye. He was dripping again. I was glad.

Imme. The Hallow Spring. Aye! Aye. Sorry. Aye.

Kaedra. She stood, and looked at my father for a moment, and then at the window where he'd frozen the sea. "Aye," she said.

Halemar. Ferries. He stood up slowly, broad and soft-spoken. "Aye," he said. "Of course aye. That's only a door."

Soren. Aye.

Meriel. She didn't stand. She put her veil back, and looked at Aurelia, and said, "Heard. And aye." And every candle in front of her bowed, all together, like grass in a wind.

Thor. She stood up so fast her chair went over backward.

"THOR," she said. "THUNDER. ALSO BEER. AYE."

Mary didn't throw anything. She just wrote it down. Thor. Thunder. Also beer. Aye.

Loki. He didn't stand. He leaned back in his borrowed chair, which he was sitting on backward, and said, "Loki. Lies. Mostly to other people. Aye," and then, because everyone was looking at him: "What? I can be sincere. I just don't like doing it in public."

* * *

Vaust stood up.

He stood up beside his chair, tall and narrow and gray, with his hands behind his back. He looked at the open door at the end of the hall, propped with its fish crate, and the bright day beyond it.

"Vaust," he said. "Thresholds." A pause. "Aye."

Then, before he sat down, he did something I'd never seen him do. He walked to the door. All the way down the hall, past the benches and the crates, while everyone watched. And he stood on the threshold of the Westmere hall, in the bright noon light, where he'd stood for a long breath every time he'd come through it for three days.

And he stepped over it without stopping.

And then back again. And sat down.

Nobody said anything. But Ansel, in the chair nearest the door, put his hand over his eyes for a moment, and the little gold light at his side burned a shade brighter.

* * *

My father voted last of the forty. He always does. He says the chair that's the King's shouldn't go first, in case anyone thinks they ought to follow it.

"Uriah," he said. "Storms. Winter." He paused. "Aye."

And then the crates.

* * *

I hadn't known it would be like that. The crates.

A hundred and three of them. The small gods, the new gods, the gods with no chairs, who come to Council to watch and almost never speak. And every one of them stood up. On their crate, or their bench, or their bit of floor by the wall. Every one. And said their name, and what they were, and aye.

Morning. The crossroads lamp at Sedge. Aye. Pim held his lantern up to the window so he could be seen, and Mary leaned out and wrote it.

Tessel. The well in the square at Hallowmere. Aye.

Brindle. Mill-ponds. On the far side of the Varrow. The little god of mill-ponds who'd said he'd keep very quiet indeed. He looked around at all the faces. "I'd still rather nobody stripped my pond," he said. "But I'd rather they didn't strip anyone else's, either. Aye."

The first frost on the ash trees above Lyradon. I don't have a name yet. Aye.

Sahrun. The rain that comes up the valley in the afternoon. And nine rows of leeks. He looked at Selvane. "Aye."

Mary wore out three pencils.

* * *

"Forty chairs," said Mary, when it was done. She put down the third pencil. "Forty ayes. A hundred and three crates. A hundred and three ayes." She looked up over her glasses. "That's everyone."

Aurelia didn't say anything for a moment.

Then she turned to the fire, where Selvane was sitting with Ilyra on her stool beside her, and Tessaly in its clay cup in her lap.

"Selvane," she said. "Of the harbors. You have the harbor. All of them. Every harbor in the Accord."

Selvane looked at her.

And then down at the cup in her lap.

And the little yellow light of Tessaly, very slowly, while we all watched, got brighter. Not much. Just a little. The way a lamp does when somebody turns up the wick, because someone's coming up the road and they want to be sure they can see it.

* * *

"The second question," said Aurelia.

The hall went quiet again.

"Not war," she said. "I want to be very clear. I'm not asking this Council to declare war on anyone. I'm asking something smaller and harder." She looked down the long table. "I'm asking whether the Accord will make ready. Not to fight him. To go and get them. The three hundred and eleven. The four hundred harbors. The forty-one, and every forty-one there's ever been." She paused. "When we're ready. Not tonight. Not angry. Not alone."

She was quoting Carol. I saw Carol, on the bench beside me, go pink.

"It means Iselle learns what she can do, and what it costs," said Aurelia. "It means the Prince learns the harbors from Bram Halloran, and the shape of every hold on the Kethran coast. It means Eleanor and Davren work out how to walk a listening road backward. It means some of you train. And some of you carry." She looked at Halemar. "And all of us wait, without doing anything stupid, until the day it can be done without anyone being thrown."

"And then?" said Kaedra.

"And then we go and open a garden," said Aurelia. "Gently. From the outside. With permission from everyone inside it." She paused. "And if he stands in the way, we'll ask him to move."

* * *

This one was slower.

Nobody voted nay. I want that written down. But not everyone voted aye.

The two northern river brothers stood up one after the other and said they'd rather not say. Mary wrote it exactly. Rather not say. One of the old wind gods from the eastern hills said the same. So did six of the crates.

Everyone else said aye.

Halemar stood up for the second question and didn't say anything at all for a long moment.

"I said I'd never carried anyone to a war," he said at last. "And I won't. I'd like that understood." He turned his broad hands over. "But a garden isn't a war. And three hundred and eleven people, standing in rows, waiting for a door, are just people who need to get across some water." He looked at Selvane. "That's my whole craft. Getting people across. And home." A pause. "When it's time, I'll carry them. Every one. Aye."

* * *

"Thirty-seven chairs aye," said Mary. "Three would rather not say. Ninety-seven crates aye. Six would rather not say." She looked up. "Carried."

"Carried," said Aurelia. "Thank you. All of you. Including the ones who'd rather not say. That's an honest answer and I'd sooner have it than a false aye." She glanced at the river brothers, who looked surprised to be thanked, and then pleased, and then, for once, at each other.

* * *

"The third question," said Aurelia.

She waited until the hall was quiet. It took a while. People had started talking, after the second vote, the way they do when something heavy has been set down.

"Ansel," she said, "said something two days ago that I haven't been able to put down." She looked at the chair by the door. "He said nobody ever said no to him. He said he wished someone had."

Ansel didn't move.

"The Princess said no," said Aurelia. "Malachar heard it. He stopped speaking." She paused. "But nobody has ever asked him anything. Not once, in three hundred years. Not properly. Not in a way that left room for him to say yes."

The hall was very still.

"So the third question is this," said Aurelia. "Before we make ready to open his garden, should we ask him to open it? A letter. From this Council. Plainly written. Asking him to let them go. All of them. And saying that if he does, the door is open on this side. For them." She hesitated. "And for him, if he ever comes and knocks."

* * *

Thor stood up.

"That's mad," she said.

"Yes," said Aurelia.

"He threw a goddess into the sea. He put a hand over the eyes of four hundred harbors. He tried to carry my little spark across the world in a chain." Thor's braid was crackling. "And you want to write him a letter?"

"I want to ask him," said Aurelia. "Once. Properly. Because that's who we are. And because if we don't, we're only a bigger hand than his." She looked at Thor steadily. "He'll probably say no. I know that. I'd still rather he had the chance to say it."

Thor stood there for a long time, breathing hard.

Then she sat down.

"Aye," she said, very grudgingly, to the table. "Loudly. Under protest. Aye."

* * *

Carol stood up.

She's not a chair. Nobody on the family bench is. But she stood anyway, in her blue coat, with her hands open, and Aurelia saw her and nodded.

"May I write it?" said Carol. "The letter. I won't sign it with anything but my name." She took a breath. "He's never once said my whole name. I'd like him to read it. And I'd like him to read a letter that asks him something, and means it, and leaves room for no." She looked at Ansel. "Somebody should have done that for you."

Ansel took his hand away from his eyes.

"Yes," he said quietly. "Somebody should."

* * *

Forty chairs aye.

Even the river brothers. Even the wind god from the east. They looked at each other and then at Carol and said aye, both of them, and one of them said, astonished at himself, "I didn't think I'd want to. I want to."

The crates were louder than the chairs.

And when Mary had written the last name, and put down the eleventh pencil, which was the only one she hadn't used, Halemar of the ferries stood up a third time and said:

"Who'll carry it?"

Nobody answered for a moment.

"I will," said Halemar. "If nobody minds. It's only a letter. Getting things across water is what I'm for." He looked at the sea through the window. "I've never crossed that one. Nobody has, from this side, in three hundred years. Not without being sent back." He turned his broad hands over. "I'd like to try. With something that isn't a weapon. I think he'll let a ferryman through."

* * *

That night Westmere had a feast.

Nobody planned it. It just happened, the way things do in harbor towns. Tamar's wife put a pot on, and then Mistress Ostry put a pot on, and then everybody did, and by eight o'clock the whole harbor wall was trestle tables end to end from the Hold steps to the north pier, with lanterns on poles and a hundred and forty-three gods and most of the town and every child in it.

Pim lit the lamp at a quarter past six, as always, with the whole wall watching. And when it caught, the whole wall cheered, and she went red and ran back to her father, and Selvane, at the far end of the nearest table between Ilyra and Saba, put her hand over her mouth and laughed. Properly. The first time I'd heard her laugh.

Thor and Edric had a contest about who could fish longer without catching anything. Edric won. Thor accused him of cheating. Edric said he'd been practicing for three winters.

Iselle danced with Roderic. Then with Kip. Then with Saba, who said she'd forgotten how and then remembered on the second step. Then, very shyly, with Ansel, who said he'd never danced in his life and turned out to be quite good.

Little Uriah fell asleep under the table with his fist full of somebody's bread and a faint blue-and-gold crackle running around his fingers when he dreamed.

* * *

I sat on the wall at the end of it all, very late, with Carol, our feet hanging over the water, and Pim's lamp burning at the end of the pier.

"Will he say yes?" said Carol.

"No," I said. "Probably not."

"I know." She leaned against my shoulder. "I'm going to ask anyway."

"I know."

And it was then, sitting there, that I felt something. Very faint. At the edge of everything I could feel. Back along the wall, at the long tables, among the hundred and forty-three gods.

A candle going out.

Not a real one. Not quite. Just a little gutter, a little dip, in one of the steady lights I'd been feeling all day, the way a flame dips in a draft from a door you didn't know was open. And then it steadied again.

I turned and looked.

Meriel was sitting at the far end of the third table with Soren. She had her veil back. She was laughing at something he'd said. Her candles were in front of her, all of them, burning tall and white.

I watched them for a long time.

They didn't gutter again.

"Garrick?" said Carol.

"Nothing," I said. "A draft."

I've thought about that a great deal since. That I said nothing. That I didn't get up and go down the wall and knock three times on the table in front of her and ask.

* * *

Mary wrote it at two in the morning, at the end of the long table in the empty hall, with all eleven pencils worn down to stubs except one.

THE VOTE.

First question: sanctuary. Harbor-right for the whole Accord. Every domain a harbor to anyone fleeing Kethra, if they ask. Forty chairs aye. One hundred and three crates aye. Everyone.

Selvane has the harbor. All of them. Tessaly got brighter.

Vaust stepped over the threshold without stopping. Then back. Ansel put his hand over his eyes.

Second question: make ready. Not war. To go and get them. When it's ready. Not tonight, not angry, not alone. Thirty-seven chairs aye. Three rather not say. Ninety-seven crates aye. Six rather not say. Carried.

Halemar: when it's time, I'll carry them. Every one.

Third question: ask him first. A letter. Thor: that's mad. Aurelia: yes. Forty chairs aye. Every crate aye. Thor aye, loudly, under protest.

Carol will write it. Halemar will carry it.

No declaration of war. Not yet.

Every name is written. I have checked twice.

And under that, in a broad, slow hand, carefully formed, like a man who writes very rarely and wants to get it right:

Halemar. Ferries. I carry people home.