Chapter 2, The Smallest Audience

The sound under the wheels changed. “Hey boss!”, Heave called out. “We’ve hit gravel, there’s a town coming up. Yar yawned and stretched, nearly knocking Seltheen out of the wagon. “At last!” he exclaimed happily. “Look alive everyone. We will soon meet some people. And remember the code of the performer: always give the audience a show. Always give them your best, .whether it’s a crowd or a single person.”

“Oh” said Seltheen in the same tone. “I’m sure it will be easy for you, having had a lot of practice performing for just one person.” He smiled broadly “That’s quite true, I have played to audiences of one.” He paused thoughtfully. “And less!”

“Wait, how can there be an audience of less than one? I mean an audience of none can’t actually be called an audience!” Seltheen’s exclamation brought gasps form both mules. “Now she’s gone and done it” groaned Ho. “Yup”, said Heave, “now here it comes.”

“It was the strangest thing”, mused Yar. “It was evening, and there was a storm brewing. I was in the middle of nowhere, lost.” “That’s before he had us”, Heave interjected. “We aren’t as bad at directions as him.” “Well, um”, resumed Yar. “so I had found this cave, it had the remains of a wall at the front, and a lot of marks inside that showed it had been used before. Just in time too, a hurricane hit the area just as I entered. The trail I had been following was washed out immediately and the bricks shook from the impact of the rain. I went in deeper, until I could put a couple of turns between me and the wind. I could still hear the storm outside, feel it too. I lit a fire and discovered that I was in a circular chamber with a niche at one end and some broken tiles on the floor that must have fallen form the walls. I realized that I was in an abandoned gorvij shrine. The gorvijes cremate their dead and make the ashes into tiles, you see. That’s how they remember them.”

“That seems strange—“ began Seltheen. Heave cut her off. “Don’t. Unless you want him to expound at length on the differences in the fate of the dead among the gorvij and rinker peoples. Let it suffice that they are different.”

Seltheen bit her tongue and said “sorry, go on with the story”.

“Yes, well then, where was I?” asked Yar, apparently confused by the sudden loss of a change of subject. “You had just realized you were in a shrine”, prompted Ho. “That’s right, I was in a shrine. A gorvij shrine that had fallen into disuse.” Seltheen shivered. One of the worst things you could say to a rinker was that their ancestors were unremembered. Yar continued. “While I waited for the place to warm up, I had a look around. Turned out there were a lot of tiles still up on the wall. They were covered in dirt and mold, so I started wiping them off. I like art, you know. I’m always looking for interesting designs I can make use of. Every gorvij tile is decorated as the maker sees fit. There are a lot of standard patterns, of course, but there’s nothing stopping someone from being totally original. So there I was, looking around at religious symbols, representations of professions, handprints of grandchildren, and such like. There was this one that was symbolic, the gorvijes say heraldic, means that it represents an important family. I’m pretty good at such things so I was trying to work out what family it was and perhaps what other families it might be associated with, when I got this feeling that I was being watched. So I looked and I saw this man standing in the fire! He was clearly a gorvij, and from the armor and weapons he had, he must have been a knight. Uh, that’s a gorvij word, it means an elite warrior, or at least someone with the status of one. Well he was in gold plate armor polished mirror bright with a silk cloak over it. And the cloak had the same design as the tile I was studying. Weird huh? He stared at me and his face contorted with fury and screamed `get out, unclean interloper!’ He strode away from the fire but with each step he faded. I mean he became more insubstantial and translucent until he completely disappeared. Which was a good thing because he had a blade staff. That’s a special weapon of the gorvijes. Imagine a straight sword blade as tall as you are. It’s a handsbreadth wide for most of its length but it tapers to a point at each end. The edges are kept razor sharp, but there are these two handles that slide up and down. So depending on the position of the handles it can be used like a spear or a broadsword, or a staff. Just as he vanished completely, he made a slash as if to take my head off!”

Yar paused for a shuddering breath. In spite of herself, Seltheen was fascinated. “I said he vanished, but I soon realized it wasn’t over. I began to feel little pains all over my body. It was like being pinched hard, over and over again. And while each one wasn’t much, adding it all up, it hurt! I realized that I was dealing with an unquiet ghost, and that he was trying to kill me or drive me away. Well I couldn’t leave. Besides the rain and wind, who knows what might be wandering out there. Could be wolves, or snakes, or apes, or—“The mules interrupted him, reciting in unison. “Or bears, or eagles, or whales or chipmunks, even!” “Don’t mock me!” retorted Yar. “You weren’t there!”

“Why would the ghost want to chase you out into the rain”, Seltheen wondered. “He was supposed to be from one of those special families, you said. Wouldn’t he be honor bound to allow you hospitality?” “A good question”, Yar responded. Indeed, their chivalry is similar to your warrior code in many ways, and yes, hospitality is part of it. But this was a sacred space. It is like your weapons, or your consecrated horse skull, you don’t let just anyone touch them, only other warriors that you respect. Well, the shrine was consecrated to the gorvij deities and I of course, am not a devotee. Hence, his duty to maintain the sanctity of the place was greater than his duty of hospitality.” “Oh” said Seltheen thoughtfully.

Yar continued. “I realized that his assaults, non physical as they were, would eventually overwhelm me. But I could not fight back, alas; I am not much of a spiritual person. So what could I do, unable to retreat or defend myself? Somehow I had to get him to stop attacking me; put his attention on something else. If I could keep him distracted until dawn, he wouldn’t be able to hurt me any more. ”So-o-o-- I told him a story.”

“You told him a story”, Seltheen repeated. “Is that your audience smaller than one?” “Of course, dear heart. An unquiet ghost does not have all the autonomy of a living person, therefore they are less than one, see?” Seltheen did not see it that way. Certainly, she would never agree that the Sacred Ancestors were any less real people than the living rinkers. It might be different for gorvijes, though, so she signified assent. Yar beamed and started again. “So this is the story I told him: Long ago, in one of the gorvij realms, the ruling family produced identical twins. It was a difficult birth, with the mother thrashing so hard, she knocked down the nurses. There was so much concern for her that the attendants lost track of which baby had come first. So they grew up in uncertainty and jealousy…”