Turning Darkness into Light by Marie Brennan

Author:Marie Brennan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Titan Books

FROM THE DIARY OF AUDREY CAMHERST

4 Messis

There’s no hope for it; the eleventh tablet is just too badly damaged. We might puzzle out another sign here and there over time, at least to the point of an educated guess, but we’ll never be able to tell what the whole thing says.

(And I keep thinking, “But Cora has such good eyes; maybe she’ll be able to piece together a bit more.” Then I remember that she’s a spy and Gleinleigh is up to something and the only person here I can trust is Kudshayn. I’m not asking her for help.)

We can tell it’s something about Hastu, at least in part; we’ve got his name, and we’ve got that word šiknas again. When I asked Kudshayn what he thought, he said, “This might be the point at which that epithet is bestowed on him.”

To which I objected, “But the text has been using it all along.”

“Yes, but why should that matter? The invocation references the siblings long before they appear; the same might be true for this, especially since it allows the scribe to give Hastu four uses of his name, once alone and then with three epithets. Surrendering precision for the sake of a poetic device is hardly unusual.”

I felt like complaining that it might be poetic, but it was confusing—I think Cora has rubbed off on me. I was not about to tell Kudshayn that, though, because he mopes around being sad that I’m not talking to her anymore. (For someone who has often been on the receiving end of human untrustworthiness, he’s far more willing to forgive her than I am.) Instead I said, “I cannot shake the feeling that this section would explain that epithet. ‘For who you are, šiknas’—doesn’t that sound like they’re naming him somehow?”

Kudshayn only shrugged. “I will look at the next section and see if there is anything of use.”

But there isn’t. It’s clear even from a glance that the text continues on to something else entirely. Unless we stumble into a full repetition on some tablet in another collection, we’re out of luck—and I don’t think that’s likely.

Unless . . . wait.

All these things began on that day. Writing, and metallurgy, and planting crops—and justice. I read something about this, I know I did. The cliff inscription from Ma’ale Tizafim? No, not that; it was a law code, but not what I’m thinking of. A narrative bit, only I can’t remember the details. Why can’t I remember them? Why does my memory have as many holes as that tablet?

later

THE BEGINNING OF JUSTICE!

That was it. A fragment of tablet that told the story of “the first judgment spoken.” And the reason I can’t remember any more details is there weren’t any; the fragment is in the hands of a private collector. (Not Gleinleigh—someone else.) It’s never been properly studied and published, at least not that I remember; just a brief mention of it from somebody—Daniela Isaquez, I think—who was allowed to take a brief look at it.

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