Even the Stones

© 2004 Dru Pagliassotti
All rights reserved.

Even the Stones
Marie Jakober
2004, Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing
ISBN 1-894063-18-X

Men of violence determine the order of the world. Those who are attacked can only choose to surrender or resist; they cannot choose to be left alone. If they are destroyed, violence has won. If they want to survive they must become fighters, and violence has won again. (p. 219)

Marwen, queen of Kamilan, abhors her husband. The crown prince Held of Dravia abducted her and forced her into marriage after rape. But she's one Kamilan woman alone in the Dravian court and can do little to fight back except deny him children and try to starve herself to death. When the prince promises her a gift from a visiting caravan, she secretly wishes for a strong horse to bear her away from Dravia. But, knowing such a wish would never be granted, she asks instead for the service of a Dravian minstrel who rides with the caravan and plays songs of the ancient Kamils.

The minstrel, Kari, had been a caravan guard before giving up her weapon to a friend in need. Now suddenly finding herself in need of employment in a strange land, she agrees to serve the queen. Soon she becomes the queen’s best friend and confidante, and before long the two women make a plan to escape the Dravians and return to Kamilan.

Their escape isn’t easy, and they stay just ahead of their pursuers, aided by strange beings and their own grim resourcefulness. At the border between Kamilan and Dravia they meet Captain Shadrak, who offers them aid. The rough but charismatic garrison leader had been born a slave but freed as a child, and although he is a brave warrior, his outland birth and barbaric ways have limited his advancement in the military. However, he remembers the queen, who once showed him great consideration when he'd been a young soldier and she a duty-burdened child.

Now the fiercely loyal captain becomes Marwen’s ally as she reclaims her throne. And she needs allies — Marwen soon finds herself pitted against councilmembers who consider her the same pliable young woman she’d been when kidnapped; struggling to appease a tradition that requires her to choose a nobly born husband to satisfy realm politics; and clashing with priests of the god Mohr, who have forbidden worship of the goddess Jana and have exiled Marwen’s sister, the priestess Medwina. Marwen wants to restore Kamilan’s ancient tradition of powerful hill queens, but in a society that has become dominated by men, she seems to be fighting a losing battle.

Even the Stones is a political and romantic fantasy with underlying messages about women’s political and institutional oppression. Although Marwen and Medwina are both powerful woman, the novel doesn’t take a shallowly heroic view, in which one person single-handedly overthrows social convention. Women must work hard to obtain and keep their freedoms, even from the men who love them. There are no easy answers or black-and-white portrayals here: the characters feel pride and anger, love and resentment, ambition and fear. Their failures are tragic and their triumphs bittersweet, and each of their acts, no matter how heroic, casts another shadow until it seems that the darkness of human discontent will be too great for anyone to dispel.

Although a solidly written fantasy in its own right, Even the Stones poses challenging questions for readers sensitive to questions of gender and power. Kiri’s concern, quoted at the beginning of this review, summarizes the debate. Can women, as difference feminists like Carol Gilligan and Sara Ruddick have tried to suggest, hold power in a way that doesn’t involve “male” violence, or is power inherently violent and oppressive? Even the Stones doesn’t provide any utopian answers; there are no great pacifists in this gritty, politically nuanced novel. Although we all know the danger of judging books by their covers, perhaps the cover art in this case reveals it all: Queen Marwen stands in a circle formed by the warrior Shadrak and his sword; that is, within a circle of masculinity and potential violence. Jakober has no doubts that holding power requires a certain level of oppression and violence, and her answer to difference feminism seems to be a sad shake of the head.

Even the Stones weaves together warfare, politics, religion, and romance to create a complex and engaging story that reads like the last, heroic flourish of trumpets against the inevitable night.

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