Smoke in the Glass

by Chris Humphreys

  The path steepened, narrowed, entered a defile, walls of rock rising each side of her, curving in to meet ahead, like an entrance. Her breath came harder. This high up the air was thin for a coastal girl. She paused for a moment, leaned against one rock face. Fant flopped beside her, long pink tongue out, panting hard – for he was as much a creature of the lowlands as she.

  ‘One more, one more,’ came from behind them. She glanced back. Nak was, as ever, behind the first llama in the line of six, all linked by rope and weighed down with supplies. Four more were yoked to the small wagon, also piled with goods, Bok atop them. With a grin, Nak waved his stick, then jabbed the long bone needle at its tip into the lead llama’s haunch. It started, spat, began to climb. She’d been trodden on before, didn’t want it again. Heaving a breath that hurt – the air this high was iced as well as hard to come by – she pushed herself off the wall, climbed to the gap, stepped through it …

  … to wonder!

  It was the first and only time ‘one more’ was right. For there, on the next peak, was a city. The city. The City of Women.

  She stopped so suddenly that Poum jerked awake and began to cry. For once Atisha didn’t instantly reach to comfort her, she was so stunned. All in her sight for near three weeks had been the grey and white of the ranges and high plateau. Here were greens and yellows, some reds, on terraces that girdled the mountain like fecund belts. These narrowed as they climbed to a great stone citadel, with towers, gateways, houses, their roofs made of dried lake reeds, the thatch an arm’s length thick. At the centre was a two-storeyed hall, its huge wooden doors flanked by giant lamps that burned with the blue flame of oil. Even as she watched, a bell sounded and immediately other lamps began to appear in the embrasures and windows that studded the walls, stars in a granite sky. She looked down and saw a bridge spanning a gorge, woven from reeds and suspended from wooden towers, two at each end.

  She felt the nudge of a llama’s snout in her back. The beasts had probably known for a time that their destination was close; that rest, fresh straw, to eat and to lie upon, awaited. But for a moment longer she did not move, her breath held, not by chill nor mountain height but by sudden fear.

  She stepped aside and, reaching around, plucked Poum from her cloth cage. Delving under layers she brought out a breast and the baby eagerly fastened on. As the caravan passed her, she turned again to the City of Women. A journey ends, she thought. Another begins. But what is our destination now?

  Beside her, Fant sank down and laid his head on his huge paws with a sigh.

  ‘You are the latest One? You?’

  The hall was alive with flame, in sconces on pillars, and in the full hearth. But it was still cold – as cold as the woman who sat in a carved chair on a raised dais, peering down at Atisha.

  Muna – so she had announced herself, governess of the City of Women – studied the paper she held, and looked at Atisha again in exaggerated disbelief. ‘Are you sure you did not steal another’s clothes and life?’ She laughed, a sound without humour. ‘In my day, the Fire God loved women with some flesh to them. I myself was … voluptuous.’ She raised fleshy arms, and a multitude of bangles slid from her wrist and stuck halfway down her forearm. ‘He did not favour girls who looked like boys.’

  Atisha stayed silent. There was no point disagreeing with the woman who now controlled her life.

  Her silence irked. ‘Proud, are we? I wouldn’t be. We have three other “Ones” here and they earn their keep like anyone else. I would have been the fourth, of course,’ she lowered her arms and the bracelets jangled down, ‘if Intitepe had not chosen as one of his twelve a witch from the Shadow Islands. I would!’ She looked around the hall for contradiction, at the dozen women who stood in a half-circle before the dais, all with their hands folded before them and their heads bowed.

  One raised hers. ‘Of course you would, Muna. Intitepe was bewitched.’

  ‘Bewitched,’ Muna repeated. ‘But she got her reward, the bitch. Insatiable, she was. Took a lover from the guards! Imagine! But Intitepe swam them both in the lava, them and their bastard son. I remember him saying to me as I comforted him afterwards, “I should have chosen you, Muna, I should—”’

  She stared above Atisha. Moments passed until the woman who’d spoken coughed softly. Muna focused, looked down again at the letter. ‘It says here … well, I think it’s best we keep what it says here between ourselves, don’t you?’ Silence still. ‘Yes?’ she snapped.

  Atisha looked directly at her. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Very well.’ She considered Atisha again. ‘Can you do anything?’

  ‘Do?’

  ‘Work, you stupid girl.’ She sniffed. ‘You look like a peasant.’

  ‘My father was a farmer. I learned something of—’

  ‘Can you sew?’

  It was a new voice that interrupted. Atisha looked at the women with the downcast eyes, did not see who had spoken.

  Muna knew. ‘Really, Besema? You would take this peasant on?’

  ‘I will if she can sew.’

  Atisha saw her now. The woman had raised her head to speak. Within a covering shroud, she saw hair as white as mountain-peak snow and a face puckered by wrinkles. The voice had been old too, like dry leaves rubbed together. Yet the eyes that turned to her now were young, as young and blue as dawn on a summer’s morning. And beyond their colour there was something in them, some appeal, some offer, some … hope. ‘I can sew,’ Atisha said quickly. ‘I won prizes for it in my town.’

  It was a lie. It was her friend Asaya who’d been the seamstress. Perhaps the governess guessed the lie. She hesitated, and for a moment Atisha feared she’d assign the peasant to work the terraces. Then she shrugged. ‘Very well. Take her, Besema. You always like the outcasts, don’t you? But be warned,’ she raised the letter and pointed. ‘This one has displeased Intitepe. Displeased him greatly. Praise him!’ She glared around and all the women, even Atisha, echoed her.

  ‘Praise him!’

  Muna waved her hand. ‘Go. All of you. You tire me. Go!’

  The women bowed, shuffled out. Poum waited in the lobby of the hall, squirming and whimpering in the arms of the servant Atisha had been forced to leave her with. In the three weeks since her birth, she not been separated from her mother, even in sleep. Fant, who’d accepted the silent command to watch over the babe, rose now and came forward, his tail wagging.

  ‘Come, pretty one, come.’ Besema stepped close, took Atisha’s arm. Her voice dropped to a low rasp. ‘Oh yes, you are a pretty one, and your child too. Whatever that bitch in there says.’ She moved away to a descending stair and Atisha, crooning soft words to Poum, followed, the dog at her heels.

  The old woman led them through a labyrinth of stairs, hallways and chambers, across gardens open to the night sky, and finally through an archway and along a winding terrace that curved around one edge of the mountain. In her first glimpse of the city, Atisha hadn’t taken in its immensity. The towers didn’t only reach three levels into the sky, but had depths far below the surface. There was a long, low structure on one terrace they passed, white-walled, reed-roofed, light spilling through gaps in shutters. Within, Atisha heard the clank of plates, the tock of wooden spoons dropped on tables, the glug of liquid into mugs, some laughter. ‘Supper time! Supper time!’ Besema sang, and giggled, and Atisha was suddenly aware of how completely famished she was. Beside her, Fant echoed her with a hungry growl.

  Eventually, they halted at another stone arch. ‘Is he good, your hound?’ Besema asked. ‘Will he obey you, keep quiet, keep still?’

  ‘He … will,’ replied Atisha, puzzled.

  ‘Good. Wait just the other side.’ She opened a wicker gate set into the archway, they passed through, she followed and closed it behind her. This terrace was darker, no torches set in walls as the others had. Starlight, and the two half moons that held the sky, revealed a little. There were t
all, dark shapes in the gloom. Fant growled – and the shapes moved, fast, separating then coalescing. Atisha grasped the collar she’d put on him for safety when they’d reached the city. ‘What is this?’ she asked.

  Besema stooped inside the arch then stood, holding a gated lantern in one hand, something else in the other. She opened the lamp, and a small, guttering light shone …

  … on a llama! It had its teeth bared, dark eyes wide over its furry muzzle. But it was just one of many, dozens of them, pushing forward into the light spill. These were bigger than the pack animals they’d travelled with, had much thicker wool coats. Atisha, who’d never feared llamas, was frightened here by this mob. Fant, who’d been kicked by one in the mountains, slunk behind her legs.

  ‘Here,’ said Besema, thrusting something up, ‘this is what they want.’

  Atisha saw what the old woman was offering – a bucket of small, wizened apples. She lifted one, held it out. ‘No,’ Besema snapped. ‘She’ll have your finger. Throw them. Throw them!’ She put the bucket down, reached in, grabbed one, tossed it into the air. Llamas moved quickly, competing. Atisha grabbed, threw. ‘Faster!’ said Besema. ‘More.’

  They passed through the herd, which scattered as the beasts chased the apples Atisha hurled. After a hundred paces they came to another wicker gate, set into a fence. Besema let them through into a small herb garden. Beyond that was a large, one-storey, white-walled, reed-thatched house.

  Behind them, the llamas shifted, snickered and stamped. ‘How many are there?’ Atisha asked, looking back.

  ‘I keep a hundred here. But I get the wool from many more. Wool and … other things.’ She opened the front door onto a room already lit. ‘Because of this.’

  In the centre of the room was a huge loom, bigger than any Atisha had ever seen. Coloured threads ran from dozens of spindles. In the loom’s centre, held like a spider’s prey in its web, was a multicoloured tapestry, filled with dozens of squares, triangles, loops.

  Besema placed the empty basket inside the door, then moved into the centre of the room. ‘You sleep there.’ She gestured to a pile of skins in the corner of the room. ‘That door,’ she pointed to one at the back, ‘is mine alone. You do not go in there, understand?’ The words were sharply spoken and Atisha nodded. ‘Good.’

  The old woman moved away, to the hearth, and the cooking pot there. She swung it over the fire, which she bent to and coaxed back with breath, then twigs then sticks then logs, into full life. Dipping her finger into the pot, she raised and licked it. ‘Hmm, guess what’s for supper? You never will. Llama stew!’ She laughed in her dry-voiced crackle then pointed to the baby fussing in the sling. ‘It will be a while. Feed your child.’

  By the time they sat at the table a little later, Poum was sleeping on the pile of furs, Fant happy nearby, gnawing a bone. Atisha had sighed when she thought of more stew. But her first bite filled her with wonder. It was savoury, spiced with herbs and chillies, delicious and deep. She swiftly finished it, scooping the last with a slice of crunchy bread. She felt she could not ask for more – and did not need to, Besema filling her bowl again with a smile. There was liquor too, a sharp distillation that had little taste but brought tears immediately to Atisha’s eyes. She sipped while Besema drank, two tumblers, three. It didn’t seem to affect her words, few of which were spoken anyway. It brightened her blue eyes still more, and they became ever more fixed on Atisha.

  A third bowl, and even Atisha was done.

  ‘Water runs from the mountain, at the edge of the house. Go clean the bowls and spoons. The pot too, you’ve emptied that.’ Besema followed Atisha’s glance to the babe in the corner. ‘The child sleeps. I will watch. Go. You earn your stew here, girl.’

  Atisha rose. Fant did too, but she waved him down to his duty. He would not let anyone harm the child.

  Outside the night was cold, a sharp contrast to the room. She shivered, hurried to the edge of the house. A stream did fall from the mountain, filling a natural stone basin before cascading on. She used a clump of moss to clean everything. The pot was encrusted, and took longer. She was almost warm by the time she finished.

  When she came back inside, she looked straight to the furs. Fant was there. Poum was not. She looked wildly about – and found her baby on the bench of the loom, in Besema’s arms. Atisha dropped everything she held, pots and bowls clanging to the floor. She drew her obsidian dagger from the sheath flush to her spine. ‘Give her to me,’ she shouted, striding forward. ‘Give her now, or—’

  She stopped at the loom’s right beam. Poum was naked, lying on her back, giggling. She circled her legs in the air, revealing and concealing the petals, the this and that at her core. ‘Of course,’ said Besema, holding her up, one hand under her bottom, one under her head. Atisha sheathed her knife, took her, checked her. She was fine, giving the smile she’d only just started to make.

  ‘She was fussing. There was a smell. I thought I’d—’ She broke off. ‘I am glad I did.’ Her voice sharpened. ‘Can you sew?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Can you sew?’

  ‘I …’ There was little point in lying. The old woman would find out soon enough. ‘No.’

  Yet instead of the expected anger, a chuckle came. ‘Well, you will learn. That, and other skills too.’ She took her upper lip between teeth still white and strong and inhaled loudly. ‘And you will need to learn fast. Because from all I know of Intitepe, he doesn’t take risks. She, as you call her, is a risk.’ She shook her head. ‘He must have loved you very much, to let you go. But the memory of that love will fade fast, in time, and in the arms of others. Soon he will remember only one thing: the prophecy.’ She rose, adding, softly, ‘I think you may be the one we have waited for all this time.’

  Atisha stared at her. She’d been the One, of course. No more. But she also knew, instantly, clearly, that the old woman wasn’t talking about her anyway.

  The girl – Napocha? Was that her name? – gave a last great cry and slipped him from her, shuddering, to fall beside him into the pool.

  Intitepe had wearied of her attempts to please him, so he had given a small grunt, pretending to be satisfied when he was not. He could not understand this latest failing. For as soon as he’d seen her again, he remembered why he had chosen the girl. She had the fairer hair of many in the northernmost province of Palaga, and a body of perfect symmetry – tall, but with large, high breasts, a slim waist, a pleasing swelling at hip and thigh. Her body was near milk white, unlike the browner girls of the coast, and he’d picked her for that contrast. It wasn’t even that she was poor at her task; she was willing, enthusiastic, keen to learn. But with the other ten in his marana, it had been the same. He’d worked his way through them, south to north, every few days for three weeks now. He’d not invited any back for a second night, nor allowed any to stay that first night beside him – he was having enough trouble sleeping as it was. Besides, none had shown any sign of being the next One.

  His hip hurt. ‘Move, Napocha,’ he snapped.

  ‘Natara, lord,’ the girl said, shifting, then looked up at him, startled. ‘I … I … I am sorry to correct you.’

  He glanced into her deep blue, fearful eyes, then away. Fear bored him. It took all delight from what he did. He didn’t want it, nor its cousin, obligation. He only wanted to be desired as he desired.

  No. I know what I want, curse it. I want Atisha.

  He stared up into the heavens, found her, down from the spider’s left eye, past the cluster of seven monkeys. The sky was clear tonight, the star bright and winking at him, as she would wink at him when she laughed at him, cried out for him, made him cry out for her. In the afterglow she would question him, her mind agile and curious. And he would tell her things, of the world and how it worked, share some of the knowledge that a five-hundred-year-old fire god had acquired. Yet she never received it in awe, in obligation, only in delight and with ever more
questions.

  Until the night had come when she’d asked him about the prophecy, the same night she’d revealed her betrayal. For what else was it? To allow herself to get with child? To give up all they’d been, and still could be, for that? For what any animal could do? She should have remained twelve years by his side not two, then returned to her village at the Festival of Change, wealthy beyond dreams, there to marry some lump of a farmer who would not believe his fortune and would give her as many children as she could want. Instead …

  His eyes searched the sky again. Only one other had ever betrayed him like that, shared the same joys and laughter – then gotten with child and questioned him on prophecy. There she was, at the head of the line of stars they called the Snake, at the top tip of its forked tongue. Besema. He remembered her name well enough. Was she still alive, in the City of Women? He doubted it. It was sixty years since he’d named the star for her. Sixty since she’d questioned him in this same pool.

  Sixty since he’d given the son she’d made to Toluc, his brother god in fire.

  He wished he could unname the star he’d given her, blot it from his mind. He’d tried – but he never could. As he knew he would never be able to unname Atisha’s.

  Yet, he realised suddenly, clearly, there was something he could do.

  ‘It was a mistake,’ he said aloud.

  ‘I am s-sorry, lord, that I offended.’

  ‘Not you.’ He rose from the pool, dripping. Grabbed a blanket to rub himself down then strode to the door, jerked it open. ‘Fetch me a runner. And find Tolucca. Send her here,’ he commanded the startled guard.

  He turned back. The girl – Natara, of course that was her name! – had risen from the pool, stood there now like a river goddess dripping water. She was magnificent. And he felt absolutely nothing for her.

  Relay runners would get to the City of Women in seven days. They would bear his command to separate Atisha and the baby immediately. Tolucca would arrive two weeks later. She would take her raven mask and her obsidian dagger. She would return with his son – if son that thing had already become – and in a great ceremony the child would be offered to the lava. It had been too long since the last sacrifice. The people needed to be reminded who he was.