Mortalis

PART 3

Where is the balance, I wonder, between community and self? When does the assertion of one's personal needs become mere selfishness?

These are questions that followed me to Dundalis, to haunt me every day. So many hopes and dreams were placed upon me, so many people believing that I somehow magically possessed the power to change their world for the better. If I had fought that battle, I believe that not only wouldIhave accomplished little, and perhaps nothing lasting, but also I would have completed the destruction of myself that the wretch Markwart began in the dungeons of St.-Mere-Abelle when he murdered my parents; that he continued on the field outside Palmaris, when he stole from me my child; and then, in Chasewind Manor, when he wounded me deeply and when he took from me my husband, my love. This was my fear, and it chased me out of Palmaris, chased me home to a quieter place.

But what if I was wrong? What if my efforts might have had some impact upon the lives of so many deserving innocents? What obligation, what responsibility, is then incumbent upon me?

Ever since I first witnessed Elbryan at his morning routine of bi'nelle dasada, I longed to learn it and to understand all the lessons that he had been taught by the Touel'alfar. I wanted to be a ranger, as was he. But now, in retrospect, I wonder if I am possessed of that same generous spirit. I learned the sword dance, and attained a level of mastery in it strong enough to complement Elbryan's own, but those other qualities of the ranger, I fear, cannot be taught. They must be a part of the heart and soul, and there, perhaps, is my failing. Elbryanno, not Elbryan, but Vightbird-so willingly threw himself into my battle with Markwart, though he was already grievously wounded and knew that doing so would surely cost him his very life. Yet he did it, without question, without fear, and without remorse because he was a ranger, because he knew that ridding the world of the demon that possessed the father Abbot of the Abellican Church was paramount, a greater responsibility than that of protecting his own flesh and blood.

I, too, went at Markwart with every ounce of my strength and willpower, but my motive at that time was not generosity of spirit but simple rage and the belief that the demon had already taken everything from me. Would I have been so willing to begin that battle if I understood that it would cost me the only thing I had remaining? If I knew that Elbryan, my dearest husband, would be lost to me forever?

I doubt that I would.

And now, with all those questions burning my every thought, I came north to the quiet Timberlands to find peace within myself. But this, I fear, is yet another of life's twisted and cruel paradoxes. I am moving toward inner peace now-I feel it keenly-but what awaits me when at last I attain that level of calm? When I find the end of turmoil, willIfind, as well, the end of meaning? Will inner peace be accompanied by nothing more than emptiness?

And yet, what is the other option? The person who strives for peace of community instead of inner peace must find just the opposite, I fear, an unattainable goal. For there will always be trouble of one sort or another. A tyrant, a war, a despotic landowner, a thief in the alley, a misguided father abbot. There is no paradise in this existence for creatures as complex as human beings. There is no perfect human world, bereft of strife and battle of one sort or another.

I know that now, or at least I fear it profoundly. And with that knowledge came the sense of futility, of running up a mud-slick steep slope, only to slide back over and over again.

Will the new father Abbot be any better than the previous one? Likely, since those electing him will be cautious to seek certain generous qualities. But what about the next after that, and after that? It will, it must, come back to Markwart, I fear; and, given that, how can I see anything more than the futility of sacrifice?

And, given that, how can I agree with Elbryan's gift of his own life?

And so here I am, in Dundalis, the place quiet and buried in deep snow as the world drifts into God's Year 828. How I long/or seasons far past, for those early years when Elbryan and I ran about Dundalis, oblivious of goblins and demons and men like father Abbot Dalebert Markwart!

Perhaps the greatest thing of all that has been stolen from me over these years was my innocence. I see the world too clearly, with all of its soiled corners.

With all of its cairns over buried heroes.

— Jilseponie Wyndon