Into the Narrowdark, page 30
They Who Watch and Shape, keep your eyes ever on the little girl, she prayed, and protect her from serpents and fierce beasts. She has done nothing wrong to anyone. She has lost her mother and father, but her life still stretches ahead of her.
“I begin to doubt we will find the child,” Matreu said after a while. “This seems much too far for you to have gone.”
An idea was in Jesa’s mind now, but she had to keep him following her. She was terrified he would suddenly realize that she was leading him away from her young charge, like a mother bird that mimes a broken wing. While her back was to him, she undid the lacing on her kirtle. Finished, she pretended to drop something and threw her arms up in dismay, then dropped to her knees. “Oh! My locket! The chain has broken!”
Matreu came up beside her, looking down at her with irritation. “What are you doing?”
“My locket. It was a gift from my lady. The chain has come loose and I have lost it somewhere.” She pretended to look, giving him a chance to see the upper part of her breasts in the loosened kirtle. It did not seem to mollify him, but it did keep him quiet for a score or so of heartbeats, then he grabbed her arm and roughly pulled her upright.
He leaned close. “If it fell and you do not know when, it is lost. You have left the child and her mother alone a cruelly long time. Keep moving.”
“But it is dear to me!”
“So is your life, I think. We have wasted enough time.”
As she pushed forward, she had a disturbing thought. He will not be tempted because he thinks he will have me whenever he wants—perhaps as soon as the baby is found.
A very short time later, when she stopped to look for sights she recognized, Matreu grabbed her arm again. “I think this is a bootless quest. I think you have lied to me.”
“No, my lord! I swear it is just ahead—the place where I left the baby!”
Swift as the strike of a Wran salt adder, his knife was out and pressed against her throat just below her jaw, so that she had to tip her head back to keep the point from piercing her skin. Matreu brought his face close to hers, brows lowered as he scowled. “If it is not, things will go badly for you, girl. I need the duchess and her child—I do not need you. And you can lead me to them just as well with only nine fingers—or perhaps without a nose. And I can still make other use of you, though I may need to drape a veil over your face first.”
Her heart was rattling and her breath was short. Just another hundred steps or so, that was all she needed. “I swear by God and Heaven!”
He turned her around, put his hand in the small of her back, and pushed so hard that she stumbled and almost fell. “Any more delays,” he warned her, “and I will see if a girl from the swamp screams as loud as one from the islands.”
At last she stopped on a high, steep bank beside the river, and pointed down into the reeds below. “There. They are hiding there, I swear it!”
Matreu looked past her but could see little from where he stood. “Why would they choose such a place?”
“So the reeds would hide them. Look! Can you not see them?!”
He stepped up beside her and peered down to the reeds and marshy ground a good distance below, gripping her forearm with one hand. “I see nothing—”
“Look closer.” Even as she spoke, Jesa put both hands on his side and pushed as hard as she could. Her sleeve tore away in his fist, but Matreu was a large, strong man, and for a moment he swayed but did not fall, swinging his arms for balance as he teetered on the high bank. Jesa bent and snatched up a branch as thick as her wrist and shoved him with it. He slipped over the edge with a sputtering curse. She heard him fall crunching into the reeds below, then the noise of him splashing in the shallow, muddy water.
“You are dead, woman!” he shouted, so full of rage that his cry felt like it could wound her flesh by itself. “I will cut your heart out!” More sounds rose, splashing, reeds rattling, and the increasingly furious sound of his cursing. Jesa finally found the courage to look over the edge.
Matreu was thigh-deep in muddy water, his fine clothes soaked, in the middle of a forest of reeds whose feathery tops waved high above his head. The stems around him had been knocked down by his angry struggles but the sea of reeds extended in all directions. He stared up at her with unmasked hatred. “I will take your nose and both ears, you vile creature,” he shouted, and spat up at her. “I will cut you open like a rabbit, from cunny to gorge!” He cursed again and tried to shake something from his hand. “What is this foulness?” In his sudden puzzlement he sounded as though he actually expected her to answer. “God burn me if I lie, I swear you will be . . .” He trailed off, and she could see him struggling to climb through the surrounding reeds toward the bank. “Aaah! What muck is this? It sticks to me and burns like fire.”
As she watched him fighting his way through the forest of reeds, she suddenly realized she had wagered everything on a single long throw. Had she been wrong?
Then she saw the first of the ghants making its way through the swaying stalks, its stubby, dun-colored head gleaming like polished bone. Matreu was busily trying to free himself from the frothy ooze that clung to the reeds in pale, drooping strands. As he struggled to scrape it off his arms and legs and clothing, Jesa could see more heads on shell-covered bodies popping up in the reeds all around him, moving slowly inward.
Jesa had prayed she could find the ghant nest again. Thank you, They Who Watch and Shape. Thank you for this salvation.
Matreu heard the commotion in the reeds around him but had time only to pull his sword from its sheath before the first wave of ghants was upon him, shells rattling as they leaped from fallen trunk to fallen trunk or climbed over the backs of their fellows. Matreu was shouting now, a wordless, incoherent scream of rage and fear and disgust. His sword smacked against the nearest ghants and one or two fell backward into the shallow, muddy water, oozing pinkish-gray blood, but dozens had closed on him now, swarming like maggots on rotting flesh. He collapsed into the muddy water as more ghants hurried forward through the reeds to clamber onto the heaving pile. Some of the newcomers trailed long ropes of wet froth as if they meant to bind him like a spider’s prey, but others must have bit at him or torn his flesh with their bony, clutching hands, because the silted water began to redden around the place where he had fallen. Matreu was now entirely invisible beneath a squirming carpet of child-sized creatures.
Jesa turned away. She did not need to see the last moments to know Matreu had received what he deserved, nor did she want to be there when the crablike creatures had finished with him.
She scrambled along the bank, headed back the way she had come. The only noises she could hear behind her now were the clicks and slurps of the ghants feeding.
* * *
* * *
She approached the spot as silently as she could, uncertain whether Viscount Matreu’s men might still be nearby, though she had seen no further signs of them. Jesa could not hear any sound from Serasina even as she drew close to the hiding place, and her skin was cold with fear. But when she reached the spot on the hillside where she had left the basket, she found the infant girl just waking, eyes still gummy with sleep. Jesa snatched the baby up and clutched her to her chest.
“Ah, the gods are good to us,” she whispered, and then wept, as much from fear and exhaustion as relief. As she held the baby close and kissed her, Jesa’s tears dripped onto the child’s precious head. “The gods are so good.”
15
A Taste of Witchwood
Viyeki watched as Sacrifices and Builders hurriedly dismantled the sprawling camp beside the road, readying for the day’s journey. Undead Hakatri’s high-wheeled black wagon stood by itself in the center of the wide track. Even with all the bustle and chaos of breaking camp, not a single Builder or Sacrifice went near it, as if it were surrounded by an unseen wall.
He saw that Pratiki was also watching the proceedings, and called, “May the Garden keep you, Serenity.”
“And greetings to you as well, High Magister,” called the prince-templar, then gestured for Viyeki to join him. The pair of clerics that generally trailed close behind Pratiki, like animal familiars, moved back several respectful paces as Viyeki approached. For a while he and the prince-templar simply stood, watching in silence as a good-sized village was folded up into bundles of sticks and cloth and loaded onto carts.
Viyeki thought Pratiki looked more careworn than usual, though it was always difficult to assess the appearance of one of the long-lived Hamakha Clan. Still, Viyeki felt more than a touch of unease to see weariness written so plainly on Pratiki’s face: if something happened to the prince-templar, he knew, General Kikiti would be left in total command here. The general had made it clear many times that he considered the high magister of the Builders to be an irritation or worse—untrustworthy, insufficiently devout, and not even a member of an important family. Viyeki suspected that only the prince-templar’s favor had kept him safe.
Am I being protected by Pratiki for some reason I cannot understand? And will I even know if that protection suddenly ends, or simply be dragged out and executed by General Kikiti’s Sacrifices?
His anxious curiosity finally got the better of him. “Is there something my Builders and I can do for you, Serenity? Because you have only to ask and it will be done.”
Pratiki showed him a narrow, official smile. “Very kind. In fact, I do have something to share with you, Magister. Something that may make your planning easier.”
“I will be grateful for any help, Serenity.”
“Do you play shaynat?” the prince-templar asked, catching Viyeki by surprise.
“A little, yes. But I would never claim to be an adept, only an interested novice.”
Pratiki nodded. “We should play—but not during our next halt, because I fear we will not have any opportunity. Not only do I have something to share with you, but General Kikiti will be meeting with officers of the Northeastern Host, and I must at least make a brief appearance.” Again, the careful smile. “I will be honest with you, Magister, if you will keep my secret—I do not much enjoy such meetings. The demands of protocol are wearisome, and the company is often boring, but of course I must represent the Mother of All and our clan.”
The Northeastern Host. Again, they were speaking of an army that Viyeki had not even known existed until a short time ago, but which they were apparently meeting. As so often during these odd conversations with the prince-templar, Viyeki found himself with little he dared say in reply. “I am certain no one else could manage such a thing with as much grace as you will, Serenity.”
Pratiki frowned, giving Viyeki an anxious moment. Had he offended somehow? Had he misread the situation? The problem with any kind of familiarity with a high noble was that the disparity of power never disappeared, even when the noble in question pretended that it had.
But the prince-templar only said, “Grace. That is a pretty word, good Viyeki, but it feels false. Let us say this instead: I am m’shi.”
It was an old Hikeda’yasao word that meant both “water” and “watery,” but also signified “that which fits where it is put,” as water traveled quietly but swiftly to the first place that would contain it, then conformed to that place. The term could be both a compliment or gentle criticism, and Viyeki heard both shades in Pratiki’s tone.
“I thank you for telling me what to expect, Serenity,” Viyeki said after a long moment had passed.
“I would have to be as wise as the Mother of All to know truly what to expect, Magister,” said Pratiki. “As you have doubtless noticed, we are at the very center—the crossing-point—of many, many possibilities.” A moment later he signaled that he wished to be alone, so Viyeki retreated. Pratiki’s clerics moved back to his side as quickly as baby birds, as though they had been shivering without his nurturing warmth.
* * *
To Tzoja’s immense relief, even so late in the year, she could still find agate mushrooms for the queen’s tincture, though she required the help of more than a few slaves to gather enough for her needs. She thought it was beyond strange to be giving orders to her own kind when only days earlier Tzoja had been the one scurrying to obey others.
I act for the queen now, at least for a little while longer. That is power. If I wished, could I claim one of these slaves had refused me and have her put to death?
The idle thought made her suddenly feel ill, so that she put her head down and breathed deeply until her stomach stopped cramping.
Tzoja found maidenhair ferns on the forested hillside north of the conquered fortress, in a gulley where a spring appeared from beneath the rocks and began its journey to join the Nartha River below. Maidenhair and other ferns grew all around the burbling spring, and although Tzoja could not ignore the Hamakha guard watching everything that she and the slaves did, she much enjoyed the time spent near the greenery and flowing water.
This one small place, she thought in wonderment, only a few hundred paces from where the walls fell and so many people died, yet it seems another country.
It was hard to return to captivity when the sun began to set, but she at least had the satisfaction of seeing several baskets of maidenhair ferns carried back toward Naglimund.
The queen had allowed Tzoja a small, precious cask of cloudberry wine to use in her work, the liquor that only the Hamakha Clan was allowed to possess now that the witchwood had all but vanished. When she was back in the wagon she shared with Vordis, Tzoja measured it out carefully into half a dozen clay jars stuffed with agate mushroom and ferns. When she had filled all the jars and stoppered them, certain that she had made at least three moons’ supply of elixir for the queen, almost a full cup of the strong wine remained in the bottom of the cask. She sniffed it and was stunned by its many notes of flowers and spices and fragrant bark, as well as some bitter scents she could not identify, acrid hints of mineral and smoke.
“Here,” she said to Vordis, pouring out a little into a bowl. “Drink this.”
“Is it the queen’s tincture?” the blind woman said. “I do not think I am strong enough to drink something made for the queen.”
“It is better than any mere tincture—at least for you and me. It is cloudberry wine, and what’s left is just for us. Drink! And I will drink some too.”
Still worried, Vordis lifted the bowl to her lips, sniffed, and made a face. “It smells so strong!”
Tzoja laughed. “You may never have this chance again, dear friend. There is kei-mi in it—witchwood. This liquor is rarer than gold.”
“I wouldn’t drink gold, either.”
Tzoja poured the rest into her food bowl and sloshed a little around in her mouth. The unfamiliar flavor struck her tongue like water on a hot rock. The first taste was harsh and hot like the brandy Valada Roskva had once shared with her back at the Astaline settlement. The shock of that had made her sneeze, which had sent Roskva into gales of laughter, but she had managed to drink it all and was soon glad she had done so. Cloudberry wine was both stronger and more subtle, and at first it was all Tzoja could do to hold it in her mouth and not spit it out. Then she began to taste the other flavors and to feel what seemed like a trail of molten honey trickling down her throat and into her stomach, as if a warm light was illuminating her from within. She almost felt she could look down and see it through her skin, glowing like a lantern. She laughed again, this time in surprise at how alive it felt inside her.
“Drink,” she urged Vordis. “You must. It is quite wonderful.” The wine’s berry and blossom flavors and its stranger, more savory tastes combined in her mouth as she took her second sip. She detected a subtle breath of mint, and thought she also tasted fennel, thyme, and a different minty flavor that she guessed was birch bark, which the Astalines made into beer every spring. Then again, she thought, perhaps that was the hint of witchwood, since the Hikeda’ya said at least a drop was put in every jar. She poured half of what remained into Vordis’s bowl—her friend was carefully sipping now—and the rest into her own.
“Oh,” said Vordis reverently. “I feel it in my chest. It’s so warm! Like drinking summertime.”
“Enjoy it,” Tzoja told her. “For a little while, we can be immortals, too.”
Soon they were both swept up and carried on a balmy breeze of merriment. Everything that Tzoja said, even the most ordinary of stories about her girlhood or her experiences of later years, made Vordis giggle uncontrollably, which set Tzoja laughing as well. They embraced, telling each other that they had never had such a good friend before. Vordis suddenly began to weep. Tzoja put her arms around her and kissed the tears from her cheeks. “Here, here,” she said. “What’s wrong?”
“You. You had a family. I was taken from mine so young, I hardly remember them. And you had a brother, too.”
“He was quiet and angry,” Tzoja said, and found her own eyes beginning to fill. “Always angry. My mother blamed him simply for being a boy, because she said one day he would grow into a man and make women suffer.”
“He sounds sad and lovely,” Vordis said, then burst into tears again. “You have been so many places! But I have spent my days in darkness.”
Tzoja could think of nothing to say, though the thought that someone could be envious of her fragmented, confined life astonished her. She held Vordis and kissed her cheek again. “All will be well,” she said, over and over. “All will be well.”
Sometime later, when they were once more in fits of laughter, the door to their wagon flew open. Two Hamakha Guards in their frightening serpent helmets looked in at them, faces set in grim disapproval.
