entirely upon our individual past experience. My mother, however,
has insisted that I undertake this ridiculous chore, and I will, as
always, do as she tells me to do.
The more I’ve thought about it, though, the more I’ve come to
realize that when Ce’Nedra first broached the subject to me, and
later to my mother, her obviously specious argument about ‘the
well-being of the young’ actually had more merit than that devious
little girl realized. One day Geran will be the Rivan King and
the Guardian of the Orb, and over the centuries, I’ve found that
people with at least a nodding acquaintance with true history
make the best rulers. At least they don’t repeat the mistakes of
the past.
If all Geran and his sons really needed to rule the Rivans were
to be a flat recounting of the deeds of assorted rulers of assorted
kingdoms in ages past, the tiresome repetition of the ‘and then, and
then, and then’ that so delights the stodgy members of the Tolnedran
Historical Society would be more than sufficient.
As my daughter-in-law so cunningly pointed out, however, the
‘and thens’ of those Tolnedran scholars deal with only a part of the
world. There’s another world out there, and things happen in that
other world that Tolnedrans are constitutionally incapable of
comprehending. Ultimately it will be this unseen world that the Rivan
King must know if he is to properly perform his task.
Even so, I could have devoutly maintained that my father’s
longwinded version of the history of our peculiar world had already
filled in that obvious gap. I even went so far as to re-read father’s
tedious story, trying very hard to prove to myself – and to my
mother – that I’d really have nothing to add. Soon father’s glaring
omissions began to leap off the page at me. The old fraud hadn’t
told the whole story, and mother knew it.
In father’s defense, however, I’ll admit that there were events that
took place when he wasn’t present and others during which he
didn’t fully understand what was really happening. Moreover, some
of the omissions which so irritated me as I read had their origin in his
desire to compress seven thousand years of history into something of
manageable length. I’ll forgive him those lapses, but couldn’t he at
least have gotten names and dates right? For the sake of keeping
peace in the family, I’ll gloss over his imperfect memory of just who
said what in any given conversation. Human memory – and that’s
assuming that my father’s human – is never really all that exact, I
suppose. Why don’t we just say that father and I remember things
a little differently and let it go at that, shall we? Try to keep that in
mind as you go along. Don’t waste your time and mine – by
pointing out assorted variations.
The more I read, the more I came to realize that things I know
and father doesn’t would be essential parts of Geran’s education.
Moreover, a probably hereditary enthusiasm for a more complete
story began to come over me. I tried to fight it, but it soon conquered
me. I discovered that I actually wanted to tell my side of the
story.
I have a few suspicions about the origins of my change of heart,
but I don’t think this is the place to air them.
The central fact of my early life was my sister Beldaran. We were
twins, and in some respects even closer than twins. To this very day
we’re still not apart. Beldaran, dead these three thousand years and
more, is still very much a part of me. I grieve for her every day.
That might help to explain why I sometimes appear somber and
withdrawn. Father’s narrative makes some issue of the fact that I
seldom smile. What’s there to smile about, Old Wolf?
As father pointed out, I’ve read extensively, and I’ve noticed that
biographies normally begin at birth. Beldaran and I, however, began
just a bit earlier than that. For reasons of her own, mother arranged
it that way.
So now, why don’t we get started?
It was warm and dark, and we floated in absolute contentment,
listening to the sound of mother’s heart and the rush of her blood
through her veins as her body nourished us. That’s my first memory
– that and mother’s thought gently saying to us, ‘Wake up.’
We’ve made no secret of mother’s origins. What isn’t widely
known is the fact that the Master summoned her, just as he
summoned all the rest of us. She’s as much Aldur’s disciple as any of
us are. We all serve him in our own peculiar ways. Mother, however,
was not born human, and she perceived rather early in her
pregnancy that Beldaran and I had none of those instincts that are inborn
in wolves. I’ve since learned that this caused her much concern, and
she consulted with the Master at some length about it, and her
suggested solution was eminently practical. Since beldaran and I
had no instincts, mother proposed to the Master that she might
begin our education while we were still enwombed. I think her
suggestion might have startled Aldur, but he quickly saw its virtue.
And so it was that mother took steps to make certain that my sister
and I had certain necessary information – even before we were born.
During the course of a normal human pregnancy, the unborn lives
in a world consisting entirely of physical sensation. Beldaran and I,
however, were gently guided somewhat further. My father rather
arrogantly states that he began my education after Beldaran’s
wedding, but that’s hardly accurate. Did he really think that I was a
vegetable before that? My education – and Beldaran’s began before
we ever saw the light of day.
Father’s approach to education is disputational. As first disciple,
he’d been obliged to oversee the early education of my various
uncles. He forced them to think and to argue as a means of guiding
them along the thorny path to independent thought – although he
sometimes carried it to extremes. Mother was born wolf, and her
approach is more elemental. Wolves are pack-animals, and they
don’t think independently. Mother simply told Beldaran and me,
‘This is the way it is. This is the way it always has been, and always
will be.’ Father teaches you to question; mother teaches you to
accept. It’s an interesting variation.
At first, Beldaran and I were identical twins and as close as that
term implies. When mother’s thought woke us, however, she rather
carefully began to separate us. I received certain instruction that
Beldaran didn’t, and she received lessons that I didn’t. I think I felt
that wrench more keenly than Beldaran did. She knew her purpose;
I spent years groping for mine.
The separation was very painful for me. I seem to remember
reaching out to my sister and saying to her in our own private
language, ‘You’re so far away now.’ Actually, of course, she wasn’t.
We were both still confined in that small, warm place beneath
mother’s heart, but always before our minds had been linked, and
now they were inexorably moving apart. If you think about it a bit,
I’m sure you’ll understand.
After we awoke, mother’s thought was with us continually. The
sound of it was as warm and comforting as the place where we floated,
but the place nourished only our bodies. Mother’s thought nourished
our minds – with those subtle variations I previously mentioned. I
suspect that what I was and what I have become is the result of that
womb-dark period in my life when Beldaran and-I floated in perfect
sisterhood – until mother’s thought began to separate us.
And then in time there was another thought as well. Mother had
prepared us for that intrusion upon what had been a very private
little world. After my sister and I had become more fully aware and
conscious of our separation and some of the reasons for it, Aldur’s
thought joined with hers to continue our education. He patiently
explained to us right at the outset why certain alterations were going
to be necessary. My sister and I had been identical. Aldur changed
that, and most of the alterations were directed at me. Some of the
changes were physical – the darkening of my hair, for example
and others were mental. Mother had begun that mental division,
and Aldur refined it. Beldaran and I were no longer one. We were
two. Beldaran’s reaction to our further separation was one of gentle
regret. Mine was one of anger.
I rather suspect that my anger may have been a reflection of
mother’s reaction when my vagrant father and a group of Alorns
chose to slip away so that they could go off to Mallorea to retrieve
the Orb Torak had stolen from the Master. I now fully understand
why it was necessary and why father had no choice and so does