Raising Voices

1

THE CONFERENCE HAD GROWN too large for a single speaker to address it. On the morning it disbanded, therefore, two delegates from each species met with General Kynot and his loose affiliation of ministers, which included the Wren, the Dodo, and the most aggrandizing of the Grey Geese, a gander who had appointed himself.

Liir was invited, too. He asked the birds to keep an eye out for Nor. “You go everywhere, you see everything,” he said.

“We stay clear of humans when we can,” replied the Grey Goose, “present company accepted. Pro tem.”

“It’s probably futile,” Liir agreed. “Still.” He walked about with the drawing of Nor by Fiyero . “She used to look like this. She’s older by now, of course.”

“All people look alike to me,” murmured a Vleckmarsh.

“She’s simply beautiful,” said the blind Heron.

“Well, thanks just the same,” said Liir, tucking the paper away.

The General gave a rambling address that confused everyone, including himself. “To conclude,” he conceded, “we go on to new work. The Birds run a risk of reverting to behaviors less than helpful. Now, I don’t mean to besmirch the fine Ostriches from the Sour Sands, who because they don’t fly were not part of our Conference. But we all know what Ostriches are rumored to do when faced with a crisis. We must not retreat into our claques and clans. Wary of human settlements-yes, who wouldn’t be? Let’s not be stupid about humans. But wary of one another? A little less so, if we can manage.”

“And a little more chatter amongst us,” added Dosey the Wren. “In ways we are only beginning to understand, we are the eyes of Oz.”

“When can Witch Nation have a reunion?” asked the Dodo. “This was fun.”

“The boy-broomist must go and make his own nest. And I?-off and away to my family,” said the General. “The wife, you know, and there was a new clutch of eggs last spring. But there are the families of those Birds who were heinously trapped and slain by the Yunamata. Those families should be contacted, if we can figure out how.”

“I’ll take care of that, sir,” said Dosey.

“You take care of yourself, missie.”

“Should this be an annual event?” asked the Dodo. “Ought I be taking notes? I mean mental notes, at least?” But the General had lifted himself onto the hump of a sudden, warmer breeze, and whatever he answered over his shoulder could not be heard in the cheer that went up to bid him good-bye.

2

LIIR DIDN’T ASK THE GREY GOOSE for company, but the Goose followed along behind. It was a problem. The Goose was too regal to be servile, and too beautiful; he made Liir feel like a chimney sweep who hadn’t seen a bath in a month. The Goose called himself Iskinaary.

They flew from the southern edge of the Emerald City and headed straight out across Restwater, keeping east of the isthmus between the lakes. If the mauntery of Saint Glinda had been torched, Liir didn’t want to know about it yet.

Where the Vinkus River seeped along flat-bouldered steps into Restwater, they stopped to get their breath, and they surprised a fox out of a clump of wrestlebush. The fox dove at Iskinaary and wrenched his wing, but Liir clobbered the fox with the broom, and the fox let go. His wing drenched in blood, Iskinaary shed unashamed tears at his disfigurement. Closer examination proved that the damage was, indeed, slight. Nonetheless, if they were to proceed together, they’d need to go on foot.

“I don’t mind a chance to give my legs some exercise,” said Liir.

“That’s the most disingenuous thing I’ve ever heard,” said Iskinaary. “And it’s not as if you have particularly handsome legs.”

“They walk faster than yours do, I’ve noticed.”

“If you want to walk faster, you’ll have to carry me.”

Iskinaary was heavy to carry, and for all his beauty he still smelled very much like a Goose. Still, Liir didn’t mind that the trip would take a little longer. So much had happened. A chance for reflection was welcome.

He was returning now, having accomplished something at last-a set of dragon murders, regrettable, but there you go. He was eager to know how his accomplishment would fit in the house. What he and Candle would be like together now. He had no experience of a happy return, ever. He would hardly know what to say, where to smile. He hoped that not knowing might seem wonderful.

He knew more about human warmth, too, from Trism. How that knowledge would translate in the presence of Candle was a puzzle to anticipate with excitement.

When they reached the Disappointments south of the Vinkus River, it was sunset, and the cold dusk made them shiver. But there was evidence of the tiny flower known as Shatter Ice-four little bluets in a nest of the tiniest emerald leaves-which meant the hump of the winter had been passed, and spring, however long it took to arrive, had started on its way.

ISKINAARY’S WING HAD MENDEDa bit-not much-by the time they approached the series of wooded knolls in which Apple Press Farm was hidden.

“You’re not planning on staying and becoming domesticated, I assume,” said Liir. “I mean, it’d be fine to see you, umm, swanning about our meadows, but I can’t expect that would give you anything approaching professional satisfaction.”

“I have my own ambitions,” said Iskinaary. “I’m intelligent as well as gorgeous, you know. Leave it to me.”

“To be more specific,” said Liir gingerly, “I’m not necessarily inviting you to take up residence with us permanently. No hard feelings.”

Iskinaary shrugged, as much as a Grey Goose could shrug. “Makes no difference to me what you say,” he replied. “I wasn’t waiting for an engraved invitation. I’ll follow my own instincts. We Animals stillhave instincts, you know.”

“Touché. And your instinct is?”

“To keep my own counsel.”

They entered the woods, slopping through mushy hillocks of drifted snow. “And, being instinct rich, Iskinaary, have you any opinion whatmy instincts are?”

“You’re not untalented,” said Iskinaary, overlooking the slight sarcasm in Liir’s tone. “You’re even rather smart. For a human. You keep excellent company.”

“Yourself.”

“Exactly. Furthermore, from what I’ve observed, you have a talent for reading the past.”

“What does that mean?”

Iskinaary honked. “What it sounds. There are very few who can read the future. And you’ve mentioned this Candle of yours can read the present. But reading the past is a skill in and of itself. It’s not just knowing the past. It’s feeling it. It’s deriving new strength and knowledge from it-learning from it all the time. It’s my own guess that this was intended to be the great strength of human beings, when the Unnamed God came up with the notion of you. Sadly, like so many good ideas, it hasn’t quite worked out in practice.”

“Thank you very much.”

“No insult intended.”

“I didn’t know you believed in the Unnamed God.”

“I was speaking metaphorically. I assumed you’d get that. Is this the place you’re looking for?”

It was. The low roofs of the dependences, and the main structure of the house itself, and the big barn room in which the broken press presumably still stood. Perhaps it could be made to work again.

They came the long way around, to approach from the open meadow by the front door. There they found that Liir’s invitation had been accepted. Nine tents were erected in the meadow, as perfectly aligned as the casual ramble of the fences would allow. Eight subordinate tents made a square, and the Princess Nastoya’s tent stood centrally.

With her canny ways, and for all the advance warning of this contingent of Scrow, Candle ought to have known he was coming. Nonetheless, she seemed surprised. Surprised, and flustered, large and slow, even redder of face than her natural coloring suggested was possible. Perhaps blood pressure problems? Or had she been experimenting with native rouges?

He approached her cautiously-as if she were a young novice, not a farm bride. He took her hands and held them, and found out that even now he didn’t know how he felt. “I’ve flown the world,” he said.

“Welcome home from the world.” Her face was tucked down, as if she were shy. A new shyness.

“Candle,” he said, “has the fellow called Trism come here?”

She looked up at him from under a wrinkled brow. “He said you’d ask for him. I couldn’t be sure of him; he seemed a soldier of some sort. Well, now you’ve asked, and right off. Though I’d have thought you’d enquire if I was all right first! All these guests, and me in this state!”

“Of course-of course. But I can see you’re all right. And I don’t know if Trism survived.”

“Well, he did,” she said, summarily. “Oh, Liir,” she continued, her voice now sounding as if he’d only been gone an hour, and she’d missed him for sixty full minutes, “look what’s happened, and I wanted to greet you on our own.” She spread her hands at the meadow.

“I know,” he said. “I invited them.”

“I’m glad you finally arrived to greet them, then. They’ve been here a week, and my careful larder is just about bare. The one older fellow speaks a rude sort of Qua’ati, but I can’t make out a thing from the others.”

The Scrow were trying to brew a kind of tea out of the bark of apple trees and such sap as was running in the maples. They wrinkled their noses at it and hardly seemed to notice Liir’s arrival.

“In the family way, I note,” said Iskinaary pointedly, slipping into Qua’ati effortlessly, “or are you just big-boned, my dear?”