Penric and the Shaman

by Lois McMaster Bujold

  Penric stared meditatively, then muttered, “Huh,” and turned his horse back.

  “What was this place? What happened to it?” Oswyl asked, looking over his shoulder as he followed.

  “Castle Martenden. The clan of kin Martenden used to be something of a force in this region, for good or ill, but four years ago last spring the fortress was gutted with fire. Its lord had been charged with an, er, attempted murder, but fought his way free of the town guard and fled north over the mountains with a remnant of his men. He was reported to have raised a mercenary company in Carpagamo, but, happily, instead of returning to make trouble here, he took them on to the wars on the Ibran peninsula, where he may well have better hopes of restoring his fortunes.”

  The endemic wars against the Roknari Quadrene heretics in those far realms were a noted sink of landless men, both honorable ones and rogues. Oswyl nodded understanding. “But why hasn’t it been repaired and put back into use by the town, to guard the road?”

  “Tied up in litigation. Lord kin Martenden managed to be both attainted by the town council for his crime, and interdicted by the Temple for, er, certain impieties, so both claimed the spoils. The law courts of Martensbridge have been as good as a cockpit ever since. Townsmen take bets on the outcomes of the latest appeals.”

  Oswyl considered this tale, lips pursing. “Was he actually guilty of the crime charged, do you have any idea? Because… interests can have strange effects on such disputes.” He frowned in speculation.

  “Oh,” said Penric airily, “I’m sure he was. There were warranted witnesses. And confessions.”

  The sorcerer then directed his attention to the hamlet on the opposite side of the road, and its shabby inn and alehouse, as a source of hot cider and information. While the troop took advantage of the former, Oswyl pursued the latter. Yes, the tapster opined, there might have been such a young man pass through a week ago, but many travelers refreshed themselves here, though few lingered, pushing on instead to the larger towns at the lake’s head or foot. Not for the first time, Oswyl wished Inglis kin Wolfcliff had possessed the courtesy and foresight to be born with a large portwine birthmark on his face, or six fingers on his left hand, or grown to a giant of a man, or a dwarf, or had a limp or a stammer, or anything memorable at all.

  “Do you think you will be able to identify the accursed man, should we ever come up to him?” Oswyl, exasperated, asked Penric as they mounted and headed north once more.

  The youth looked introspective for a moment. “Oh, yes. If he’s an invested shaman, Desdemona can’t mistake him.”

  “And who,” Oswyl went on, not less exasperated, “is this bloody Desdemona woman you keep going on about?” Wife? Sister? Leman? Not a member of this party, in any case.

  Penric—Learned Penric, the gods help them all—blinked. “Oh! I’m sorry. I did not realize you had not been introduced. Desdemona is my demon.” He smiled cheerily across at Oswyl.

  “You named your demon?”

  “Really, it was necessary. To keep all of her straight. She’s quite a complicated person.”

  In Oswyl’s theology, demons were not persons at all, but elemental forces of… un-nature. From the gods, or at least, from one god, but not by that reason holy. “I thought demons were fundamental chaos. Not capable of being anything.”

  “They all start out that way, it’s true. Not anything at first. Rather like a newborn infant. But like an infant, they learn. Or perhaps copy. They learn from the people and the world around them, and they carry much of that learning along with them as they cascade down through time from master to master. Everything about them that might be called either good or evil comes ultimately from their human riders.”

  Oswyl frowned at this novel view. “I thought they were inherently destructive, and dangerous withal.”

  “Well, so they are, but destruction need not be inherently evil. It depends upon how cleverly it is deployed. When Desdemona was the possession of Learned Helvia, who was a physician, she destroyed stones of the bladder, a very painful condition I am told, and warts, and sometimes even tumors.” He added after a distracted moment, “And worms, that were debilitating their victims. Though an apothecary’s vermifuge could do that task as well.”

  If sorcerers were rare, physician-sorcerers were rarer still. “I have never met such a practitioner.”

  “I gather they are kept rather apart by the Mother’s Order, to spare them for special tasks.” After a thoughtful moment, he added, “Their sex, too, is something demons learn. Desdemona has been possessed by some ten women over time—plus the mare and the lioness—so she’s grown quite feminine by now. She’s an exceptionally old demon. It’s rude to tell a woman’s age, Penric!” His hand flew to his lips. “Uh, sorry. That was Des.”

  “It… talks? With your mouth? And yet it is not ascendant?”

  “She. Yes, she does, and no, she’s not. They can get quite chatty, among the ten of them. So if I say something strange, ah… it might not always be me. I should warn you of that, I suppose.”

  A sudden change in demeanor and speech was supposed to be one way an observer who was not a Temple sensitive could tell if a demon had ascended, seizing control of its rider’s body for itself. But if the demon was leaking out all the time, how could it be discerned if such an emergency had occurred? Oswyl edged his horse slightly farther from the sorcerer’s.

  Penric piffled on, “Back at seminary I once sat down with a quill and paper and tried to work out her exact age, going back through all her riders one by one. Connecting them to some dated king’s reign or public event whenever we could.”

  Reluctantly fascinated, Oswyl asked, “How do you keep them all straight? Or do you?”

  Penric let his reins fall to his plodding horse’s neck, held up both hands, and wriggled the digits, as if pleased to find them in place there. “Ten ladies, ten fingers. Very convenient.”

  “Ah,” Oswyl managed.

  “The Temple had planned to gift their star demon to another physician when Helvia died, but instead it jumped to a senior acolyte named Ruchia, who was of Martensbridge here. Oh, I see”—Penric blinked absently—“Helvia was visiting Martensbridge at the time. I’d wondered about that. Anyway, the Bastard’s Order at Martensbridge not being slow off the mark, they promptly claimed Ruchia for themselves, and hurried her through the tutorials of a divine. In return, Learned Ruchia gave, er, extremely varied service to the Order and the Temple for the next forty years. She certainly seems to have traveled, in her duties. Which was how, when she had her fatal seizure of the heart some four years back, I came upon her on the roadside near Greenwell Town, and… here we all are.”

  “How old were you?”

  “Nineteen.”

  Making him all of twenty-three, now. He still looked nineteen. Or, Oswyl might allow, twenty. At a stretch. “Were you some sort of precocious scholar, as a youth?”

  “Not at all. I liked to read, but there weren’t many books to be had in Greenwell.”

  “Yet you dashed through the learning for a divine in just four years?” It normally took six.

  “Three. I came back here to the Princess-Archdivine’s service last spring. You have to realize, I—we—had already been through the training for a divine four times already. In a sense. And twice for a physician. So it was more of a refreshing. I tried to talk the seminary’s masters into granting me my rank fivefold on that basis, but they resisted my blandishments, more’s the pity.”

  “I suppose… it was as if you already carried a tutor inside of you?” Which seemed like cheating, somehow.

  Penric grimaced. “Mostly. Although Desdemona thought it was just hilarious never to help me out during my oral examinations. It would have been bad for you, Penric.” His brows twitched up, and his mouth, down. “Ha-ha.”

  Was that last an interjection from the demon? The voice sounded faintly altered in cadence and accent from the strangely sunny young man’s usual tones.

  “That was Ruchia,” Penric
put in, confirming Oswyl’s guess. “Desdemona speaks with her voice a lot. I don’t know if it’s because she is the latest and freshest, er, imprint, or held the demon longest, or simply had the strongest temperament. Time may have something to do with it. The first three women are almost impossible to tell apart, and I don’t think it’s just because they shared the Cedonian language. They may be melting together with age.” He stared out over the lake, pewter gray and rippling bleakly in the chill wind blowing down from the distant mountain peaks shrouded with clouds. “Altogether, I calculated my demon is just over two hundred years old. I have noted,” he added, “that the demon-generations are getting longer, as this tale goes on. I find that heartening, myself. I sometimes wonder what my… imprint will seem like, to the next person to inherit Desdemona.”

  “Your head seems very, uh, crowded,” Oswyl offered at last, into the rather blighted silence that followed this.

  “Very,” said Penric. He brightened. “But at least I never lack for tales.”

  “I… wait. Now which was Desdemona, again?” The question he’d started this interrogation with, Oswyl dimly recalled. He kept his fingers curled firmly on his reins.

  “That’s my name for all of her together. Like a town council of ten older sisters who issue one edict. It also saves my running down several names every time I wish to address her, like my father shouting at his children.”

  “I… see.” Oswyl’s brows drew down. “The sorcerer I rode with from Easthome never told me anything like this.” The dour fellow had not talked much at all, in fact.

  “Perhaps his demon was younger and less developed. Perhaps he does not have a very cordial relation with it, if its prior riders were not happy men.” Penric’s lips twitched up, and his voice shifted a betraying hair. “Perhaps you never asked—Inquirer.”

  Oswyl hunched his shoulders and pressed his horse into a trot. They could not reach the next town soon enough. And I am betting not only my mission, but maybe my life, upon this mad-brained sorcerer? Father of Winter, in this Your season, help me!

  IV

  Inglis woke in dimness, but not darkness. A bright square proved to be a small window on the wall of a hut, covered with parchment. On the opposite side, a rough stone fireplace gave off a red gleam and a few yellow flickers, like animal eyes peering out of a little cave. The walls were a mix of stone and logs, chinked with moss and mud. He lay tucked up in a nest of faintly reeky furs, on a floor of dirt scattered with crushed bracken. The big dog lay curled at his feet, sleeping, its paws loose and relaxed.

  His boots and outer garments were gone, his chest bare. Convulsively, he felt at his waist, then sagged back down as his hand found his knife hilt. He still wore his belt and trousers. He had no memory of having arrived here, but he did have a dim recollection of someone feeding him warmed water, and of floating awake in darkness only to drown again. How much time had passed…?

  And do you still have all your fingers and toes, fool? That was a question he might answer. He struggled up out of the furs—bear, sheepskin, others less identifiable. His hands were stiff and swollen, but not tipped white or scabbed black. His right leg was bruised dark purple from knee to bulging ankle; he couldn’t tell if anything was broken, but it did not move well. Sprained, certainly. Three of his right toes oozed, as if burned. The left foot was no worse than his hands.

  How much time lost? Had he missed all of yesterday? Anxiously, he sat up straight, squinted, and began the familiar count down the red scabs crisscrossing his arms. Twenty-five, the tally of his nightmare flight. Had it been twenty-five at last reckoning? Yes. Had he lost a day, failed to blood his knife, like a lazy farmer neglecting to feed his pig trapped starving in its pen? Had he lost… everything? He pulled the blade from its sheath, cradled it in his hands like a child, crooned anxiously. Extended his senses as painfully as he shifted his body. Oh bless, the faint warmth still hummed… he wasn’t sure if he should thank any god for it. Or if any god would ever thank him. No telling. For twenty-five days, he had not dared to pray.

  Except for this. He counted down the scabs, trying to recall which arm he had used last. He’d alternated strictly, to give time to heal between assaults. Infection was a constant risk. He should whet the knife again soon, to keep it sharp and make this easier. His right hand was steadier just now; so, left arm. He composed himself as well as he could, closed his eyes, and sliced: angled, shallow. He panted, waited for his head to stop swimming, the twist of nausea to settle. Opened his eyes again. Blood flow sluggish, but maybe if he squeezed there’d be enough that he wouldn’t have to take a second—

  The hut’s door banged open, and he flinched worse than at the cutting. Blurry silhouettes swirled against the bright mountain air beyond. He blinked through tears more from the sharp pain of the light than the gash on his arm, and the figures resolved into a woman, sheepskin cloak bundled about her, carrying a small cloth sack and a copper pitcher, and a man in leathers wearing a sheepskin vest, fleece turned inward. The dog jerked alert and growled, but the growl trailed off in a few tail-thumps of recognition.

  Seeing him sitting up, the woman said, “Oh, you’re awake,” but then, as she came closer, cried sharply, “What are you doing?”

  He wanted to hide knife and arms beneath the furs, but he dared not stop this once started. “Stand back!” he commanded, and, as she made to swoop on him, “Stand back.” The dog scrambled up, fur rising along its spine. The woman stopped abruptly, staring in dismay. The man’s hand froze on the work-knife at his belt.

  Whispering words under his breath that were supposed to help his focus, but really didn’t just now, he stropped the knife blade up and down along his arm, coating it thoroughly in sticky red. Would it be enough to buy one more day? The faint hum seemed to strengthen. Yes. Perhaps. He wasn’t sure but what a single drop would do the job as well, but he couldn’t take chances. He held the knife in his lap, trying to protect it from his intruders’ shocked gazes. When the blood smears turned brown and crumbling, all life sucked from them, he could clean the blade and hide it away once more.

  The woman said tremulously, “I brought you food. And drink.” She held up her burdens as if in evidence.

  The man, scowling at Inglis, stepped in front of her. “Suppose you just put that knife away, fellow.”

  Did they think he threatened them? Inglis wasn’t sure he could even stand up just now, let alone attack a person. His eye drawn by the pitcher, he raised the fur across his lap and slid the knife out of sight down next to his right thigh. He licked dry lips and set both hands out atop the cover, spread and still. He most certainly didn’t want to frighten off that charitable young woman. Was the man’s voice one of those he had heard in his daze upon the rockslide? Vulture, or rescuer? The dog sat back down.

  “What were you doing with it?” asked the woman in suspicion, coming no nearer.

  “I… it… it drinks blood.” He wondered if that sounded as deranged to them as it did to him.

  “All knives do,” observed the man, his hand not leaving his own hilt.

  Not like this one. “I drink drink,” Inglis essayed hopefully.

  “Travelers get dry in the mountains,” said the woman, in a tone of careful placation. “They think because they are not hot, they are not thirsty.”

  “I… yes.”

  She circled wide around him to the hearth, collected a clay cup faintly familiar from last night, and filled it from the pitcher. She extended it to him with a long reach. He took it with a hand that shook, then both hands, and gulped down its contents, an unstrained barley water flavored with mint. Invalid stuff, far from a noble beverage, but it was warm, seeming both food and drink. He extended the cup back. “Please…?” He drained it three times before he stopped guzzling. He caught his breath and nodded thanks.

  “Who are you—traveler?” asked the man.

  “I, uh… Inglis k—” He cut off his too-famous kin name. “Inglis.” Oh. Should I have offered an alias?

  “Where
were you bound?” asked the young woman. “Towards Martensbridge, or Carpagamo? Either way, you took a wrong turn.”

  “Pass from Carpagamo’s closed,” said the fellow, “Unless he was the last man to come in over it.”

  Inglis shook his head. He followed the dog’s interested gaze to the cloth sack. Gingerly, the woman held it out to him. His clumsy fingers found it contained generous lumps of some soft white cheese, sheep or goat, captured between parsimonious slices of heavy barley-and-oat bread, and strips of dried smoked meat of uncertain origin. Venison, perhaps. Inglis, after a moment’s hesitation, tore into it as if he were a wolf indeed.

  After allowing the first couple of frantic swallows, the man asked, “Where’s your horse?”

  Around his mouthful Inglis answered, “Left her lame on the Crow Road. Then I walked.”

  “Oh.” The man’s mouth pursed in disappointment.

  It came to Inglis that the young woman must have prepared this repast for him, with her own hands. He eyed her more closely over his chewing. Her face was mountain-broad, lips and cheeks rouged only by cold, her body work-lean; her youth lent her a passing prettiness. The fellow was not much older. Hunter, shepherd? Both? Up here, all men put their hands to all tasks, as the turning seasons ordered them. The two shared the light hair and blue eyes of this mountain stock, close kin surely.

  “Who are you?” Inglis asked in turn after his next swallow. “Where is this place?”

  The woman smiled hesitantly at him. “I’m Beris. That’s my brother Bern.”

  Bern offered more reluctantly, “This is the summer grazing camp for Linkbeck, the village in the valley. Our hunting camp in winter.”

  So, he’d not traveled quite so far back in time as the place’s crude look suggested. Not to the world of Great Audar’s era, when these mountain tribes had held their high fastnesses against the invaders as the Wealdean forest tribes had not. Or maybe the Darthacans had taken one look at the damp precipitous country and decided they didn’t want it that much. The Temple’s invasion in these lands, replacing the old ways with the new, had been a slower process, more a gradual weeding out than a violent burning over. With a chance, a hope, if not a prayer, that they’d not uprooted everything…