Walls of Wind and the Occasional Diamond Thief Boxed Set

by Jane Ann McLachlan

  “Quack.”

  I look up and there is the boy who laughed at me the other day. He crosses the street and leans against the wall of a building, facing me with the same conceitedly amused look in his eyes. I want to say something insulting but he’s far enough away now that I’d have to raise my voice for everyone to hear, so I just glare at him. He laughs, pushes himself off the building and strolls away.

  Agatha’s still reciting the names of the produce in our basket when I feel Hamza stiffen beside me. The crowd has suddenly gone quiet, except for the market vendors, who are throwing tarps over their stalls. But it’s barely mid-afternoon.

  I turn to ask Hamza why they’re closing so early. He’s staring down the street. Agatha has stopped talking, too, and when I look where they’re looking, I see guards coming toward us. They march in uniform, their faces grim, their right hands resting lightly on the handle of some heavy and probably deadly weapon which I don’t want to see any closer, strapped to their sides.

  “What is going on?” Agatha asks quietly.

  “On Fridays,” Hamza says slowly, “they distribute justice.”

  “Justice?”

  The people around us look grim as they turn and walk in the direction the guards seem to be herding us. Vendors wipe their hands on their aprons and hang the aprons beside their stalls then briskly move into the throng. Hamza grabs Agatha’s arm and mine and urges us forward with everyone else.

  “I’m sorry,” he murmurs to us as we walk. “It doesn’t happen every Friday. Usually I stay home on Fridays, but I was not aware of...”

  “Aware of what?” Agatha says with the deliberate control of the Select. It’s a sure sign she’s upset.

  “Of any recent convictions.”

  “Select Hamza.” Agatha stops abruptly, forcing the Malemese behind her to stumble as they veer sideways around her, “tell me exactly what is about to occur or I will not take another step.”

  Hamza tightens his hold on Agatha’s arm and forcibly propels her forward. “Don’t stop,” he whispers harshly. “Do you want to be shot for refusing to be a witness to justice? Those lead-arms they’re wearing are crude but effective weapons.”

  I’d been about to rebel also; instead, I look quickly around. One of the guards is staring straight at us, his hand half-lifted to signal another guard, but he relaxes when Agatha resumes walking.

  “Where are we going?” I whisper.

  “To the public square in the center of town.”

  “And what will happen there?” Agatha asks.

  “Most likely we will witness a beheading. If there has been a theft, we will watch the culprit’s hand being cut off.”

  I stumble and would have fallen if Hamza wasn’t holding my arm. Is he serious? He must be, he’s always deadly serious. I nearly choke on that—deadly serious—and feel my throat close. I swallow, and breathe in and out quickly. I can’t be sick here.

  “I wish you did not have to see this,” Hamza says. “But the guards make no exceptions. Everyone on the streets is gathered to the square to serve witness. Justice must not only be done but must be seen to be done.”

  “You call that justice?” I ask, switching to Edoan.

  “They call that justice,” Hamza replies. “We are not here to interfere.”

  We’re at the square now. There’s a raised wooden platform in the middle, which I want to look away from but can’t. Hamza points to the far end where the King and the High Priest stand on a raised dais. They’re dressed in long dark robes, more elaborately designed and probably lined with something soft, but otherwise no different from their people’s attire.

  A half-dozen guards surround the platform looking out into the crowd. Another dozen or so patrol the parameters of the square and still others stroll through the crowd watching for... What? Defiance? A rescue attempt? The whole thing seems unreal to me—the silent crowd, the watchful guards, even the unusual brightness of the sky which casts the wooden platform into stark clarity amid the dark robes and glum brown faces that surround it like shadows. Shadow people, I think, all standing as still as the barbaric past they appear to have just stepped out of.

  A priest climbs onto the platform. He looks to be in his late thirties, and would be handsome except for his stern expression. I recognize the impassive control of a Select in his face and bearing, but don’t mention that to Hamza and Agatha.

  A guard climbs up behind the priest. He’s heavily built, at least 5’10 or 5’11. Tall, by Malemese standards. His thick, black eyebrows join above his nose in a permanent scowl and his nose is crooked, as though it has been broken. I shiver just looking at him.

  A third man follows the guard.

  “Is that the condemned man?” I really want to be sick now.

  “That is a doctor.”

  I look at Hamza. Is he developing a sense of humor now when it’s completely inappropriate? “There’s a cure for beheading?” I ask.

  “I expect we’re about to see a thief punished.” He gives me a long look.

  Two more guards climb the steps to the platform with a third person between them. They reach the top and turn. Beside me, Agatha utters a cry of horror. The figure between the guards is a boy no more than ten or twelve years old.

  His eyes are wide with terror and his chest heaves. The muscles of his face are clenched as though he’s afraid that if he relaxes for a moment he’ll shame himself even more by crying. His left hand moves convulsively, stretching and curling back into a tight fist at his side. He seems unaware of its movement.

  One of the guards leads him to a block in the center of the platform. He kneels down and puts his left hand on it, fingers spread wide. He stares at his hand as though he’s never seen it before.

  “Don’t look, Kia,” Agatha whispers. Her lips move in a silent prayer. Her face is so white that even her lips are a pale ivory color.

  “You must look, both of you” Hamza says quickly. “The guards are watching to see that we do. Try to look without seeing. Stare straight ahead but focus inward. If you can’t do that, watch the priest, not the boy. Under the law he’s still a child; they’ll only take off two of his fingers, not the whole hand.”

  I swallow, hard.

  In a loud voice that carries across the square, the priest cries out the name of the boy and his crime: theft. The priest’s face is impassive but in the sunlight I can see beads of sweat on his forehead. He grasps an axe which is leaning against the wooden block, and raises it. He holds it aloft for one terrible moment while he takes aim. He won’t do it, I think, staring at the axe as it trembles in the air.

  It flashes down so quickly I don’t believe it’s really happening until I hear it thunk deep into the block of wood.

  The doctor springs forward and raises the boy’s hand for all to see. The boy is staring at his hand, the thumb and first two fingers spread wide and the blood gushing from two small stumps where his middle fingers were. The doctor holds it up for only a moment before pouring an ointment over it. The boy screams then, short, high bleats of terror and shock as the doctor wraps his hand in a cloth and helps him down from the platform.

  My legs are trembling. I need to sit down but I can’t, the guards are watching. Hamza’s arm under my elbow holds me up.

  A man is led onto the platform. The priest calls out his name and offense: treason.

  Treason? What constitutes treason on this sick planet? Not watching an execution?

  The man steps forward and kneels in front of the block.

  “Where’s the doctor?” I whisper.

  “Don’t look at him,” Hamza says. “Watch the priest’s face, only the priest.”

  Agatha’s prayers are audible now, a rushed, urgent whisper of sound rising through the silent crowd. A steady line of tears tracks down her cheeks.

  I look at the priest. His mouth has tightened into a thin line of distaste. At the crime? The criminal? Or at his own role in this draconian form of justice?

  His arms rise, holding a larger ax
e this time. As he raises it above his head his sleeves fall down, revealing his arms to the elbows. The muscles in his forearms stand out in tight cords and his fingers on the axe handle are stiff with tension. The sun flashes off the blade as it hangs in the sky like an ancient sundial marking the last moment of a human life. The axe descends.

  I hear the soft slicing, the solid thunk as the blade digs into the wood. My own still-beating heart is loud in the unbearable, acquiescent silence of the crowd. I lean forward and throw up.

  I am barely aware of the long walk back to Prophet’s Lane. The smell of the crowd, a rank scent of fear and excitement, clings to me. In my room, I pull off my Malemese robe and fling it away. I want to bathe, but I’d have to leave the room and pass Agatha and Hamza to get to the wash room, and I can’t bear to look into the face of anyone who watched the execution with me. I lie across the bed. The sound of the axe digging into the wood block echoes in my mind. I crawl under the covers, close my eyes, and recite verb declensions in Kandaran...

  I wake hours later, still dressed in my jumpsuit. It is pitch dark. My left arm, minus the hand, lies heavy across my chest. I can feel the stump of my wrist above my breast. I cannot breathe, cannot move. I lie there paralyzed with terror. A strangled whimper gurgles in my throat, and I am breathing, sweating, but still too afraid to move, my every sense focused on the arm across my chest. Is there a hand or not? As nightmare and sleep recede, I gather the courage to raise my right hand, to feel along my forearm... and grasp my left hand with a relief so great it leaves me dizzy. I become aware of Agatha lying beside me in our bed, her breathing deep and regular. I am safe in the house on Prophet’s Lane.

  Not safe. None of us are safe, stranded here at the mercy of barbarians.

  I think of my bags and what’s in them and close my eyes. My left hand is still cradled in my right, but I’m no longer reassured. I listen intently: all is quiet. I get up and grope by touch in the darkness through my spacebags until I feel the smooth, hard surface of the little box of thieves’ tools Sodum gave me.

  Opening the bedroom door soundlessly, I peer out. Hamza’s bedroom door is closed. I tiptoe into the kitchen, find a large steel spoon in the cupboard, and quietly let myself out the back door.

  The clouds have returned to Malem’s sky, obscuring even the dim starlight. Nevertheless I keep close to the house, a shadow figure against the dark walls.

  What’s that? If I should be discovered now—A night bird repeats its call. I breathe out slowly.

  At the back corner of the house I crouch and dig into the dirt until I have a hole almost as deep as my elbow. I put the plastic box inside it and refill the hole, replacing on top the square of groundcover I carefully set aside. Groping in the darkness, I find a large stone which I place just to the left of the sod as a marker. The wind and rain will soon erase all sign of my digging.

  Agatha half-wakes and mumbles something when I return to the room.

  “I’m just getting undressed,” I whisper. “Go back to sleep.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  A reply to Hamza’s request for a royal audience arrives three days later. As abruptly as is possible in official Malemese, the royal courier welcomes Select Agatha and bids Select Hamza farewell. There is no invitation to attend the palace. He turns to leave.

  “I wish their Majesties good health and happiness and thank them for allowing my presence in their city,” Hamza says quickly. “Please convey my gratitude.”

  The courier bows. “I will inform the Queen. The King left this morning on a tour of the farms and will be away for several weeks.”

  “That explains Friday,” Hamza says when the courier has gone. “The King pushed those convictions through before he left. It was the only way to get the boy out of jail. The order must be signed by two of the Triumvirate and the Queen won’t sign against a child.”

  “She’s a kind woman, then,” Agatha says.

  “Do not delude yourself. The Queen has no compassion. She cannot abide the sound of a child screaming, and those who sign off must watch their commands carried out.”

  “What is it that concerns you?” Agatha asks.

  Hamza looks up slowly. “If I had known the King was leaving, I would not have brought you to their attention.”

  “They know we are here.”

  “But not that you are staying.” Hamza forgets himself so far that even I notice the small furrow between his eyebrows.

  “What are you afraid of?” Agatha’s voice is mild but she is watching Hamza intently.

  The little crease disappears. “Nothing.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Nothing, I said.”

  I pull the woolen robe over my jumpsuit and go outside. Hamza’s always gloomy, I tell myself. He’s been here ten years and nothing has happened to him. I walk slowly, looking down at the road and kicking up dirt. I’ll be leaving on the ship; it’s no concern of mine.

  The thought makes me feel worse instead of better.

  It’s just as well Agatha won’t be meeting their Majesties yet. Her Malemese is hardly presentable. She’s reached a plateau of semi-intelligibility and seems to be stuck there. I kick a stone from the dirt with such force it clatters to the end of the lane. How could the Adept have sent her here? How could she order Hamza to return, leaving Agatha alone?

  I cross the cobbled road at the end of the lane and turn down another dirt side street, preferring the earth under my feet even though I can’t feel it in these clunky Malemese boots. It’ll be months before I can walk in light, open sandals on the warm soil of Seraffa. I glance up at the tall, drab buildings. My time on Malem is slipping away and I haven’t learned anything more about my father or how he got the diamond. Knowing more about the diamonds might tell me something, but I don’t dare ask. This cold, dark city guards its secrets close.

  I hear laughter, a rare sound here, and turn onto a wider street. A group of ten or twelve Malemese about my age are kicking around a ball. I stop to watch. They’re in teams, one group with their backs to me, guarding two stones a few feet apart, the other group facing them. They control the ball with their feet, never touching it with their hands.

  Kickball, I think, or something close to it. The teams are mixed, girls and guys playing together, hiking the heavy woolen robes they wear up high enough to kick the ball.

  I tried to join a kickball team at school when I was a kid, but everyone knew my father and the fevers that made his mind wander. Every mistake I made, they asked if he taught me that move. I quit after the second game. I practiced on my own, though, till I got every move down perfect, better than anyone playing on the school team—then I tossed my ball in the recycler.

  I start to back up before they see me, but as I do a girl kicks the ball so awkwardly it wobbles straight to a guy on the opposite team, and nobody laughs or groans or hoots. Some people, I think. They can do anything and everyone likes them. But that’s not me, so I turn to leave.

  Something bumps into the back of my boot. I look down at the ball they’ve been playing with. “Kick it!” someone yells.

  They just want a laugh; they’re expecting me to fumble it. I’m tempted to prove them wrong, but they won’t care. If I was an outsider at home, I’m a million times more of one here, a foreigner on this isolated planet where no one looks even remotely like me.

  Jaro’s image pops into my mind, shaking his head. So fail me, I think—then, Okay, what the hell, because I don’t like to fail, and I’m good at kickball. I’m already imagining the surprise on their faces as I turn and aim for the goal stones, and kick it...

  The surprise is on me because it’s made of leather or something, and even in the lower g it’s like a dead weight with no bounce at all when it hits the dirt. It kind of flops before it reaches a girl at the edge of the group, and I brace myself for laughter—but she just flashes me a quick grin and gives it a really hard whack! and scores.

  I figure I’m out of the game after a dismal play like that, but someone yells, �
��We’re a player short”—I don’t see who—and the ball comes flying toward me again. Now I’m stuck. I’ll look dumb if I play and even dumber if I leave. Well, I can’t make a worse kick than I just did, but I can make a better one, so I hook the ball. I play with it a minute between my feet, trying to get the feel of it. What a crappy ball.

  I throw myself into the kick this time, putting all my higher g muscle behind it, and send it flying right through the goal and on down the street, into a wall at the far end. Everyone stares at it, even me. Then, as if nothing happened, someone runs and gets it and the game continues.

  It’s harder than I thought, controlling the heavy leather ball with my feet, holding up the skirts of my robe, and remembering to compensate for the lower g and not send the stupid thing into space again. I think I’m doing pretty well, though, not embarrassing myself any more, when someone from my team comes up behind me and says, just loud enough for me to hear, “Quack.”

  I don’t have to turn around to know who it is. I consider taking off, but that would look dumber than staying and taking the ribbing I’ll get when they hear about me walking down the street flapping my arms. He’ll tell it worse if I’m not here. Besides, if I can get to know these teens, they’re my best chance of learning about Malemese diamonds.

  The game ends at dusk, which falls pretty fast here, the sun being as inadequate for its task as this stupid leather ball is for its. He saunters up, heart-stoppingly gorgeous except for the wicked gleam in his eye. “Not bad,” he says, and smirks, just so I know he’s thinking, for a duck, but he doesn’t say it.