They were around us before Ganver could move. It did something, a kind of shifting of space. The gray, formless place was all around us, but some of the shadows had come through as well. Ganver dropped me, spun, roared, picked me up, and did the thing—whatever it was—again. We were somewhere else, only a few shadows now, fluttering madly. One of them brushed by me, so closely I felt it and shuddered, remembering being shadow bit from that time in Chimmerdong.
“Pfowgrowl,” snarled Ganver. “Would that I had a dozen of the Gardener’s shadow-eaters and I would teach these shades to leave Eesties alone.” We fled once more, Ganver muttering as we went. “I’m going to leave you, Jinian, Dervish Daughter. Stay until I come for you. If you would know the meaning of the star-eye, watch and learn.”
The Eesty dropped me again; I felt it go, the shadows in close pursuit. Anger burned behind them like a lightning track through the gray. I was alone in a place, making a great crackle of broken shrubbery as I picked myself up.
A quiet glade. No sign of anything dying, not here. Dark stone buildings half-sheltered by the trees. Zellers grazing on the sward. Evening? Dawn? Lamplight in the windows of the place. A door opened and someone, evidently attracted by the noise I was making, called into the half-light, “Hello? Hello? Can we help you?”
I stepped out onto the meadow, adjusting my pack and keeping a pleasantly neutral expression on my face as I approached. “Hello. Yes. I seem to have lost my way.” It was a young woman in a smock, hair drawn back in a sensible braid. Something about her reminded me of Silkhands.
I said, “My name is Jinian.”
“Jinny. Do come in. I was just about to put the kettles on for the children’s wash-up, and for our tea, of course. Come into the kitchen.” She bustled off ahead of me, down a stone-floored corridor. The ceilings of the place were low, no more than a foot or so over her head. A tall man would have had to stoop. Perhaps there were no tall men here. The place looked clean enough, and yet there was a smell . . . like a latrine. A urine smell. I twitched my nose and tried to ignore it.
She opened a heavy door, closed it behind me, and gestured me to a chair as she began filling heavy kettles with water and hanging them on hooks above the fire. There were dozens of them, great iron things that looked heavy. She grunted when she heaved them, and I went to help her, curious. “Are you doing this all alone?”
She smiled at me, a tired smile. “Well, it’s all part of the dedication, isn’t it. Part of the saintly work. Thank you for your help, though. Since I’ve had this flux, it’s been hard to lift them.” Her hands on the kettle handle were raw, with chapped, bleeding places.
There was a smaller kettle hung closer to the flames. I laid more wood upon the fire as she filled it, wondering who it was who cut all that wood. If she heated so much water every morning, it would take a forest full of trees to provide the heat. Before long the small kettle began to steam, and she poured water into a teapot, setting a cup before me. “We’ve time for a cup before wash-up.” She sighed. “Now, what brings you to the Sanctuary?”
“That’s what this place is called? The Sanctuary?”
“Oh, yes. The Sanctuary and Church of St. Phallus. The monastery of those in service to the Sacred Seed.” She smiled as though these words had some particular meaning to her, face glowing briefly as in firelight. “I’m Sister Servant Rejoice.”
“Rejoice,” I murmured.
“Just call me Sister Servant,” she corrected me. “We don’t use individual designations much. Father says we don’t need them.”
“Father says that, does he,” I murmured again, sipping at my tea. I was all adrift. I understood the words she had said, but the sense of them escaped me. “Ah, Sister Servant, can you tell me how long the . . . Sanctuary and church have been here? Historically speaking?”
She was confused by this. “Always, Jinny. Always, since arrival. Since our Holy Founders broke with the evil under the mountain and brought away St. Phallus.”
“Evil under the mountain?”
“The monster makers. The triflers with the holy fruit. Some called them . . .” She looked at the closed door before whispering, “Magicians.”
Well. That placed it somewhat. This was evidently some offshoot from early times. “How long ago was that, do you know?”
She shook her head. The count of years evidently didn’t concern her, though the kettles did. She was watching them intently, waiting for steam to emerge from each one. As soon as the first was hot, she took it down from its hook and substituted another before tugging on a bell rope beside the door. Far off I could hear the jangle, insistent in the silence. Then voices. Approaching footsteps.
Those who came in were much like Sister Servant—were Sister Servants. Smocks, braids, tired-looking faces, chapped and bleeding hands. They took the steaming kettles and went out, leaving the last to boil for Rejoice. “You can come with me,” she whispered. “To see the work.”
I was too curious not to. We went down the echoing hallway to one of the rooms. In the room were half a dozen beds. On the beds were children.
So I thought. Well. An orphanage. A foundling home. I had seen such before. There was one in Xammer. We students of Vorbold’s House had borrowed babies from it from time to time in order to learn child care. I knew about babies, and my
