Scarlet Odyssey

by C. T. Rwizi

  The queen’s eyes slit and cut to the hyena, silencing the woman. “Do not presume to tell me what I can and cannot do, AmaSibere. This is my decision.” She returns to addressing the clanspeople. “I am putting the clan union on hold until further notice. All of you here will be at your sacred island by Intermission. This is not a request.”

  Silence rings all over. Salo surprises himself by breaking it. “I thank you, Your Majesty. You are most generous.”

  “Don’t,” the queen says, moving a little closer, “think I’m doing this for you.” She comes near enough to lift his chin with a slender finger. Her smile is cruel and lovely at once. She smells like power and bloodrose essence. “You are an abomination,” she whispers, “but if you succeed, you’ll be more useful to the Plains than any clan mystic could ever be.” Her finger traces his chin, then leaves, and he almost bemoans the absence of her touch. In a louder voice she says, “This meeting is concluded. You are dismissed.”

  Then Queen Irediti of the Yerezi Plains disappears into the council house, cascading skirts flowing behind her, honor guard in tow.

  He flees the compound soon afterward, hoping to find refuge in the silence of the workshop because he’s not quite ready to look anyone in the eye right now. But Aaku Malusi is already there, nursing a gourd of musuku wine by the largest table.

  His eyes glisten in the dim light of the shed’s glowvines. “You’re still alive,” he says, like he’s half-surprised by this fact.

  Salo’s heart feels like it’s about to beat right out of his chest. He drifts closer to the old man, pulls up a chair, and sits across from him. He breathes in deeply, lets it out slowly. “You saw?”

  Aaku Malusi nods. He pushes the gourd Salo’s way. “I left when she cast that spell on you. I . . . couldn’t watch.”

  Grateful for the offer, Salo reaches for the gourd and takes several desperate gulps of the cloying wine. As he sets the gourd down, he notices the wet streaks on the old man’s cheeks. He is at once deeply moved and saddened.

  “I’m fine, Aaku,” he says. “The queen is letting me awaken. Tonight! I can hardly believe it.”

  He thought Aaku Malusi might share in his joy. Instead, the old man shakes his head, despair deepening the lines on his weathered face. “Oh, you stupid boy. You stupid, foolish boy. Why did you have to tell them your secret? Why, my child?”

  For a second Salo watches him in stunned silence. “You knew about it?”

  “Of course I knew! I’m not blind. I notice things.” He points a frail finger at the old cabinet in the room. “And I know what’s hidden inside there and how you used it.”

  Salo doesn’t know what to say. He thought he was careful in all his dealings with the forbidden. He used his talisman for all his work, never writing anything down on paper, and he only ever used the Carving when he was alone. Aaku Malusi certainly never hinted that he knew what was going on under his nose. “Then . . . why didn’t you say something?”

  The old man sighs. “Because I thought you were smart enough to keep it to yourself.”

  Salo looks down at the gourd on the table, the wine turning sour in his mouth. “I take it you don’t approve.”

  “I’m worried about you, Musalodi. What you did today marked you forever as a man who doesn’t know his place. I’m worried this will be a stain you won’t ever wash off.”

  “But don’t you see?” Salo says. “I did it for the clan. I averted the hyenas taking over and undermining my aba’s rule. I’m sure everyone will understand. They have to. Don’t they?”

  The old man regards him with pity. “I think you overestimate their capacity for understanding and acceptance. I would die for this clan, my child; I would die for my tribe, but I know all too well that my people aren’t kind to those of us who are different.” Tears gather in his eyes again, and his voice wavers. “I just don’t want to see you become like me. That’s all.”

  “I . . .” Salo’s voice dies in his mouth, and he finds no words worthy to speak. What can he even say to this?

  “Musalodi!”

  A loud, angry voice coming from outside draws their attention to the door. Salo blinks, wondering why whoever it is has chosen to yell rather than knock.

  “Musalodi! Come out here and face us!”

  He stills as he recognizes the voice, cold dread settling into the pit of his stomach. “I think those are my brothers out there.”

  “Don’t move a muscle.” Aaku Malusi’s lips press together into a thin line as he rises and picks up the staff leaning against the table. He walks over to the door and opens it, stretching his normally stooped figure to its full height. When he stands erect, he is almost as tall as the chief.

  “What do you want?” he demands. “Why do you shout like this when the suns have gone down? Have you no respect?”

  “We’re not here for you, old man,” says the voice from outside. “We’re here for the siratata you’re hiding, or is he too much of a coward to face us?”

  That’s it.

  Salo shoots up to his feet and strides for the door, where Aaku Malusi is still facing down the visitors.

  “Is that any way to speak to an elder, young man? Have you no respect?”

  “We won’t leave until he comes out. Musalodi!”

  “I’m right here,” Salo says behind Aaku Malusi, intending to slip past him and out the door, but the old man blocks the way forward with his arm.

  “You don’t have to do this,” he says over his shoulder, his eyes imploring. “This is all very silly. It’s foolish.”

  “What’s the worst they could do? Beat me? If that’s their plan, then they’ll do it anyway, so I might as well get it over with.”

  Aaku Malusi holds his gaze and doesn’t move. “You don’t have to do this,” he says again.

  “You can’t protect me forever, Aaku.”

  His eyes fall to the floor, and he shakes his head in sorrow. Finally he steps aside. “I’ll be right here.”

  Salo nods in gratitude and proceeds to step through the doorway, bracing himself for the worst.

  Night has fallen outside, but the full moon and the outdoor glowvines provide more than enough light. What Salo sees makes him instantly realize that a beating is probably not the worst thing that could happen to him after all.

  No, what’s about to happen is much worse.

  He surveys the scene before him silently—they let him take a good long look. He has taken off his sandals, so he’s barefoot. He doesn’t venture too far from the door.

  Around fifty boys are standing in front of him, each with a woody reed in one hand and a steely glint in his eye. The bulk of them are among the clan’s younger rangers, though Salo spots a few white loincloths in their midst.

  His two brothers are at the front of the gang.

  Apprehension makes his limbs start to tremble. He folds his arms and puts on a stolid mask. “I’m flattered,” he says. “Truly. All this, just for me? You really shouldn’t have.”

  Sibu, the more quick-tempered of the twins, glowers with murder in his eyes, like it’s taking everything in his bones to keep his rage on a leash. “I told you this is all just a joke to him.”

  “Calm, brother,” Jio says to him. “We’re not here to fight.”

  “Are you really going to do this?” Salo says. “Are you really going to toss those things at my feet? I know you’re upset, but—”

  “Upset?” Sibu snarls. “That doesn’t even begin to describe how I feel. You’re a disgrace, Salo. You’ve disgraced our aba, and you’ve disgraced this clan.”

  His anger is like a field of dry grass just waiting for a bolt of lightning to strike it and set it on fire. Still, it’s the calm in Jio’s voice that Salo finds more disconcerting.

  “Do you remember that time Aba sent us to Khaya-Nyati?” Jio says. “I think it was three comets ago. The suns had set, and we were riding in the open wilds, just the three of us, and from out of nowhere comes this massive kerit with a mouth full of drool and teeth like d
aggers. Do you remember?”

  Salo says nothing, knowing that he is but a spectator to a performance.

  “Now, me,” Jio continues, “I thought we were done for, but you? Oh, you were like a devil unleashed with your bow.” He shakes his head as he looks Salo over, and his mouth twists with disgust. “What happened to that warrior? Who is this soft, weak, pathetic shadow of a man standing in front of me?”

  Defend yourself, damn it, Salo thinks. But he sees that he is teetering at the lip of a chasm and that saying the wrong thing could tip him over.

  Jio turns his head slightly to include the other boys in his speech. “I’ll be the first to admit it—I know we’ve been unkind to you these last few years, but a part of me always held out hope that the brother I saw that night would return to us. Now there was someone I could respect.” He looks back at Salo, and the betrayal shining in his eyes is surprisingly genuine. “Shows me what a fool I am.”

  I hurt them, Salo realizes. I hurt my brothers. But how can they be so blind? “Did I really do such a terrible thing?” he finally says. “The queen was about to hand our clan over to the hyenas. Am I the only one who remembers this? You seemed pretty opposed to it, brother. You shouted in defiance at the queen, your own mystic. You all did. But I stopped it. I bought us more time.”

  “To what end?” Sibu says. “So we can have you as our mystic? You?” He spits on the ground. “You’ve turned our clan into a laughingstock. I can hear the Sibere cackling at us as we speak. And for what? Just so you can satisfy your sick desires to have what should belong to women?”

  Salo can already see himself tipping over and falling, and a part of him recognizes that he has already lost. He tries to catch himself anyway. He takes off his spectacles and lets his brothers see his unnatural eyes, hoping that maybe this will convince them of the sincerity of his words. The world grows too bright and blurry without the magic of his spectacles correcting his vision, yet he can still see Jio’s and Sibu’s outlines etched against the false brightness.

  “I didn’t do this for myself, brothers,” he says. “You have to believe me. I did it for the clan and for the people we lost when that witch attacked.”

  “Lies!” Sibu says. “This is what you’ve always wanted, and when you saw the opportunity, you seized it. Ama as my witness, I will flay myself and jump into a cauldron of moonfire before I ever accept your blessing.”

  “We’ll never bow to you,” Jio says. “Stranger.” And then he tosses his prematurely cut reed at Salo’s feet. Salo doesn’t see it, but he hears the reed’s dull thud as it hits the ground.

  A Yerezi reed, severed before it has reached its gainful potential, hitting the dry earth unceremoniously: this is the sound of disownment, a brotherhood coming to a permanent end.

  Sibu’s reed follows. “Stranger,” he says.

  Yet another reed hits the ground, and another after it. One by one the boys come forward to sever any bonds of brotherhood that may have existed between them or could have existed in the future, each time declaring him a stranger.

  He puts on his spectacles to find that his brothers have already walked away. Meanwhile each thud of the reed is like a knife in the gut, tearing up a howling void. But he doesn’t let it take him, not in front of these boys. He stands in silence until they’ve all made their points, the reeds piling up before him. Even the young cowherds he smoked with on occasion are there, and they don’t quite meet Salo’s gaze as they toss their reeds.

  “Stranger,” the last one says before walking away. And then it is over.

  A hand comes to rest on his shoulder from behind him. “I’m so sorry,” Aaku Malusi whispers. “I’m so sorry, my child.”

  Salo wipes his cheeks and speaks without turning to face the old man. “You’ve been here before, haven’t you?”

  A pause. “I have.”

  “Then you know I need to be alone right now.”

  The hand squeezes his shoulder once, then lets go. “I’ll be there at your awakening tonight. I’ll be praying for your success.”

  “Thank you, Aaku.”

  Back in the shed, Salo sits in the lonely stillness for a long while. At some point, however, the stinging in his eyes overwhelms him, and he hunches up in a corner, convulsing. He hates himself for being so weak, so soft, for crying so much lately it feels like he’s almost always on the verge of tears. What kind of man is he? Is he even a man?

  Maybe they’re right about him. Maybe they’ve always been right.

  12: Kelafelo

  Namato—Umadiland

  In her nightmares, a crimson serpent watches from the shadows as men wearing red skulls on their faces push into her body while she bleeds from her stomach, violating her until she thinks they’ll split her in half.

  The snake watches while the men drag her screaming daughter out of her hut and cut her down like a rabid hound before leaving her broken corpse on the hard earth for the vultures and scavengers to devour. It watches as her entire world goes up in flames, as she relives that horrid night over and over again. She wakes up crying every time.

  She is still alive only because the Anchorite weakened the red mamba’s venom before asking her to kill it beneath the witchwood tree and take its mind stone. The venom still burned like sulfur through her body, leaving her writhing on the ground and screaming in pain for a whole day—one of the prices she had to pay for the spirit’s gift, a torrent of knowledge she would have needed years to acquire naturally. She can already read and write in ciphers just days after that afternoon.

  The nightmares were the other price. Sometimes they’re so overpowering she toys with the idea of finding relief via one of the poison vials on the Anchorite’s medicine rack.

  On one such occasion she goes as far as getting up from her pallet, tiptoeing across the hut toward the rack, and lifting a jet-black vial of deadly root essence. She doesn’t drink it in the end, but she keeps the vial anyway, and on subsequent nights, whenever she wakes in a cold sweat, she studies it in the starlight coming through the shutters above her pallet. She imagines herself pouring its contents down her throat, her insides turning to liquid and her blood congealing in her veins. She imagines herself gasping for her last breath. Somehow, this makes her feel a little better, and eventually she falls into a dreamless sleep.

  If the Anchorite notices the missing vial or hears Kelafelo screaming in the night, she makes no mention of it.

  They spend their mornings performing their daily chores. Kelafelo sweeps, washes, cooks, fetches water, and forages for firewood while the Anchorite feeds the chickens and tends her garden with a hoe. After high noon they sit in the yard outside, and the mystic passes on her arcane knowledge. Kelafelo struggles at first to take down everything on paper, still not quite used to the sensation of holding a quill and dipping it into a gourd of ink, but her muscle memory catches up, and soon she acquires a wealth of notes on multiple arcane subject areas.

  She learns about the six crafts of Red magic, how casting spells revolves around converting the Blood Woman’s essence into one or more of these crafts. She learns that this conversion is performed in the shards by a great pattern called an Axiom, which she must devise entirely by herself before she meets the redhawk. She learns about mind stones and their uses beyond soul charms, including the conjuring of spirits that can manifest as lightning or fire. Her mind expands with each new thing she learns, and she waits impatiently every day for the suns to arc past their zeniths so that her lessons can begin.

  Nightfall, though, brings only dread as she frets about the horrors that will visit her in her sleep. She despises herself for it, for fearing the skull-faced men so much that the thought of closing her eyes makes her shudder. She wishes she could look at them in her nightmares with nothing but the hatred she feels so intensely for them.

  She wishes she felt nothing but hatred.

  The Anchorite sits her down one day and confronts her. “Your progress is satisfactory, young girl, but I am concerned that you are cutting yo
urself off from your emotions.”

  “I don’t understand, Mamakuru,” Kelafelo deflects. “What do you mean?”

  “You are having unpleasant dreams, are you not? I sense you numbing yourself against them. You are shutting out your humanity to make the nightmares easier to bear.”

  A surge of self-loathing sours Kelafelo’s expression. “My humanity weakens me, Mamakuru. I cannot be emotional. I need to detach myself from what happened to my daughter, or I will never be strong enough to kill her murderers.”

  Kelafelo’s frown deepens as the Anchorite begins to chuckle, hoarse and throaty like a crow.

  “That is where you are wrong,” the woman says. “To become a true master of Red magic, you need your humanity. Did I not tell you that agony feeds your understanding of it?”

  Kelafelo’s anger gathers and redirects itself toward the Anchorite. “I am not afraid of pain. I will scarify my whole body—flay myself if I have to—but I cannot be weakened by sentiment. I will not.”

  The Anchorite is unmoved. “You speak only of agony of the flesh. That can be powerful, to be sure, but far more powerful is the agony that visits you in your sleep, for this is the kind that will reveal to you the greatest secrets of sorcery, secrets you could never hope to grasp with a hollow heart. The powerful emotions that come from spiritual anguish are crucibles of transformation; embrace them and let them forge you anew.”

  “I am filled to the brim with hatred. Why is that not powerful enough?”

  “Because hatred alone is not agony. Hatred is the burnt husk that agony leaves behind when it is done with you. It cannot offer you any insights into the universe. But grief and guilt—the things you feel because you have a soul—now that is where the truth lies, and with it, power.”

  “I cannot accept that. The men who killed my daughter and defiled me laughed while they did it. I saw it in their eyes. They had no humanity. They felt no remorse for what they were doing. You can’t tell me they weren’t stronger for it.”