by Guy Antibes
“I’ve brought you all this way. You better translate them.”
Bellia didn’t like the edge in Menna’s voice. “Do you want the scroll back? I can rip this up right now and then where will you be?” Bellia found herself irritated. Couldn’t Menna just treat her like a friend rather than a servant?
“Settle down,” Menna said, getting up. “I’m sorry my words came out so poorly. We’re all under some stress, now that we are close to being on our way. When Yezza gets back we all need to fill our water skins before our road takes us across the desert. I’ll be glad when we’ve crossed that. Flathua is where our adventure really begins.” She produced a dazzling smile at Bellia who only grunted. Bellia observed a glint of greed in that expression.
As Bellia scrutinized the original scroll for the hundredth time, she looked at the decorations around the words. It dawned on her that they were stylized musical notes.
As tempted as she was to pull out her flute, she resisted. She’d played all of the music in the pouch, but only when she walked out of hearing distance. She could feel a touch of magic as she played and the scenes of places she’d never been flooded her mind, but she never wanted to repeat the debacle of her first performance.
When the others left to fill water skins, Romo offered to fill hers. Bellia took the opportunity to take the scroll out and write out the parchment’s music on the back of one of Ned’s scores.
She wanted to play that music, but she didn’t know if once the scroll was translated that she’d ever see it again. It didn’t matter. Even outside the Blind God’s Temple, Bellia’s enhanced memory remained. She knew nearly every word on the scroll.
~
Bellia grew up in this desert, but she’d never walked the sands for more than a few hundred paces from the house. The air sucked the sweat right off her as she led her horse up and down over dune after dune after dune. Each rider had filled three water skins, two for their horses and one for them. Most of the skins hung on the mount of their late seventh member.
A week later, the water was going and they were just halfway through. Bellia spied the House in the afternoon sun as a smudge on the horizon.
“Look. Could that be an oasis?” Menna said.
“No. That is a wizard’s house. We all knew about it in Greenwell. They say it floats fifty feet in the air.”
“I guess he doesn’t want visitors.” Yezza spoke up for the first time in hours. Layers of filmy silk covered her head.
“I’d like to visit, it’s only a bit out of our way,” Bellia actually felt the unexpected pull of her birthplace.
“We’ll need to turn north soon enough and follow the coast to Flathua.” Menna took a sip from a canteen and turned towards the House. “Maybe we can ask for something stronger than water.”
The setting sun colored the desert in an orange light by the time they reached her home. It was just as Bellia remembered. She looked up at the dark bottom of the House along with the others.
“I wish we could fill our water skins,” Romo said. They all craned their necks upwards.
Taking a deep breath, she took a sip of water and walked off into the desert. The sun’s descent let the sands cool. She stepped on something hard and pulled up a human femur. The twilight let her see the gnaw marks left by scavengers. It must have been the intruder that she pushed off of porch.
Looking around, she knew her traveling companions couldn’t see her in the darkening light. She flexed her fingers to punch the return code to the house. She pushed her hands forward six times, each position of her fingers in certain spots. As she finished, she found herself standing in the Great Room. In the darkness, it all seemed the same. She worked the code to activate the lights.
The brightness assaulted her eyes. The House looked the same after her five-year absence. The smudges by the remains of her family still lay like shadows on the carpet in front of the fireplace. The air curtain continued to keep out the insects and birds.
She wandered around once again. Memories came to the front of her mind, long since pushed back into the darkness of the past. She felt her face dampen as tears ran from her eyes. While she drifted from room to room, she felt the soul of the House. The essence that had made it her family’s had vanished, yet she couldn’t deny the familiarity of the house that had been home for her childhood.
Perhaps she could return to live here after her quest. Walking through the empty house didn’t hold the horror it had when she was fourteen. A lot had happened to her and to people she knew. She realized how much more perspective she had after all these years.
Bellia stood in her father’s library and wondered if her father owned a dictionary in the ancient tongue of the scroll. If anyone possessed such a thing, it would be at the Temple or in her father’s workshop.
An hour of searching produced the work she sought. The parchment nearly cracked as she unrolled the set of scrolls. Her memory of Menna’s treasure guide firmly in him mind, she eventually found the words she sought. They were names of places. No wonder she couldn’t decipher them; the names had changed.
Bellia laid down on one of the couches and closed her eyes. The next thing she knew, morning arrived. She walked out to the porch and leaned around to see her friends stirring in the camp. She transported down to the desert floor.
“The wizard transported me up to his house.” Bellia said as she walked into the camp. “It seems he knew my father. He’ll fill our water skins if we take them over there.” She pointed to a random spot beneath the house, but behind a small dune.
“Sounds good to me,” one of Yezza’s men said.
“Does he have any real food?” Romo asked.
“Not much. Not enough to share. There is some wine, though.” That brightened them all up. Bellia thought it would.
They all dragged their partially full water skins into a pile at the bottom of the House. Bellia turned to look at the skins and made the teleportation gestures. The water skins had to be taken into the kitchen. Bellia dredged up the spell for water in her memories and filled the family cistern that sat just above the kitchen and bathroom. There should be more than sufficient water to fill up the skins.
She let the water run to clean the pipes and thought of the waste dropping below. That would surprise her friends. When she finished her work, she dragged the water skins and a small cask of wine into the Great Room. She decided she’d take one last tour.
Bellia walked back to her father’s office. She decided to look again in the hidden drawer. She spied the amulet she let stay in the drawer when she first set out to find Pock.
It shone like it was polished yesterday. Now she could read the Grianna writing on the amulet. “Given this day to Norlian, my son, Third in Line.” A picture of Bellia’s grandfather showed in profile on the other side. She put the chain around her neck, hid the coin between her breasts, where it hung next to the wolf’s head. Her father’s spell book was put into a pocket to go with the little one that had remained close to her, but unread, for all of her time away.
Now she felt it was time to go. She reinforced the spells that held the House up along with the air curtain. With the water skins at her feet, she punched the codes to take her to the sandy floor below.
Everyone sat a few paces away, shaded by the House.
“Here it is. The wizard requested we not return.”
“Who’d want to come out in a hot desert to live? Only a crazy man,” Menna said as she started to drag skin skins across the sand. “At least we won’t have to worry about dying of thirst out here.” Menna looked up and yelled, “Thank you, wizard!” Menna never ceased to amaze.
They set off north across the desert, to hit the coast close to Flathua.
Bellia fingered the shape of the amulet through her shirt. She felt she had been nudged once again. Their path followed a logical route, but Bellia could sometimes nearly feel the Blind God’s presence at times. Perhaps the Temple had affected her more deeply than she thought.
~
Ten ships sat in the harbor waiting for a place at the port’s four docks. The glamour of Flathua to a younger Bellia didn’t wear well five years later. It wasn’t that Bellia was taller and stronger. She’d seen more of the world than her mother and father intended.
Her five companions stretched out in single file ahead of her as they rode down the twisting road leading from the cliffs overlooking the little port. She let some distance grow between them physically and mentally.
Perhaps the time had come to have some kind of plan of what to do and where to go. Again and again, she thought about flight and hiding. That kind of thinking made her wonder if that wasn’t what she was doing right then, following. Was she just a follower? The position of sergeant provided a touch of relief, but she still followed the lieutenant. She knew the Blind God nudged her, but she also realized that she made her own choices and had fought her own way out of every situation she faced.
Her personality made her unsuitable to be a Reader, she realized, even if they did accept women. The time might come when she might return Tuathua to volunteer for Ranger work, but her goal after this wild goose chase would be to seek out Rullon in Togolath and then take her quest to Grianna.
She might not have the answers, but right now, Bellia didn’t know the questions and she would try her best to by the time she reached the capital city of Grian. That was goal enough for now.
Menna called her name. Bellia knocked her heels against the sides of the horse and quickly caught up.
“Lost in thought?”
“Just wondering what I’ll be doing after we retrieve the treasure.” Bellia could tell Menna didn’t believe her. “I’m going to see someone I met at the Temple who lives in Togolath after we’re done.”
“You don’t care about the treasure, do you?” Menna said.
“Not really. You know I’m not a greedy ex-soldier like you.” Bellia grinned at her friend.
“I know. That’s why you were my first choice to join us.”
“After you couldn’t find anyone else to read the map.” Bellia continued to grin. It really didn’t matter to her how much they would find. She just needed enough to get her to Togolath and beyond to Grianna. She really didn’t need more than what already lined her belt and sat in the purse in her bags.
“So right you are, as usual. Let’s find us a ship to Eustia.” She snapped her reins and urged her horse on, laughing. Menna’s spirit was infectious and everyone followed, racing into Flathua.
~
Four of the soldiers of fortune regularly sent offerings into the sea as the sickness took them. Yezza and Bellia found their sea legs quickly. Bellia couldn’t understand why the others were so sick. She stood at the bow watching the sea foam burst from the prow of the ship.
“We soon reach Eustia, eh?” Yezza said. “It has been many years since I rode the plains in Middab. You will like the plains, I think, Bellia.”
“I plan to go to Togolath.”
“Togolath.” Yezza spit into the sea. “A city of thieves. They have no honor.” She laughed. “Who am I to talk? I left the Middab and went to Togolath myself.”
“Why did you leave?”
Yezza blanched. “You think I left on my own accord? No. My husband sold me into slavery.”
“But your tokens, your swords. Why couldn’t you stay?”
“My husband sold me to a man from Togolath who wanted a Middab bride. He said he liked the spirit of Middab women. He had me shipped up to him in a caravan.”
Bellia couldn’t imagine becoming a slave.
“I killed all in the caravan before we arrived. I took their money as the price for my abduction. Unfortunately, my former husband would never see it that way, so I bought passage to Testia. That’s when I met Menna. We landed in Barloo years ago.” Yezza jerked her head and sneered at Menna’s back.
“Will you return to the Middab?”
“No. It would mean my life for certain. Perhaps we will travel to Togolath together, eh? It takes a little longer to skirt the plains, or better yet sail there. I have no need for these two once I have the treasure.” She tossed her head towards her men. “You will help me kill them, yes? Perhaps your friend Romo and Menna might also not make it to the Temple at Helevat? That will mean more for you and me.”
Bellia just stayed silent. She’d be killing no one out of hand. “Perhaps. But I would like to see the Middab. We could meet in Togolath.”
“Suit yourself.” Yezza darkened and left her side.
Bellia continued to look out to sea. So it was going to be like that. Every person was on their own. Could she even trust Menna and Romo? She knew the answer to that, but tucked it away deep into her mind. The bow was empty except for her; the wind blew from her back. She pulled out her flute and began to play a tune. They were all memorized now. The one she chose brought to mind the sun rising on a grassy plain
Bellia could tell all of the tunes held a certain power, but none more potent than the music that surrounded Menna’s parchment. She felt her hackles rise when she played past fifteen or twenty notes. The music had to be part of the key to the treasure, but the words on the parchment didn’t mention whatever that was.
She put the flute to her lips and played the song that brought the best feelings within her. As she moved her fingers over the holes, visions of clear skies and vast meadows and a feeling of oneness in the world came to her mind. She felt centered as she played. Yezza returned to clamp her hand on Bellia’s wrist.
“I like that one, but it hurts me to listen to it. Please stop.” Her voice was hoarse. The music affected her like none of the others. Bellia realized that the wind didn’t stop the sound from carrying back into the ship. She shrugged and put the flute away. Yezza continued to be a mystery to her. In most ways like a warrior and at other times her sensitivity broke through. A full range of emotions ruled the woman as much as she tried to control the tender ones.
~~~
Chapter Twenty
Palubat to Helevat
~
The shore of the country of Pellna on Eustia’s southeastern corner darkened the horizon. For the past two weeks the group had practiced their swordsmanship on the deck. Bellia stood at her customary position on the bow, her body covered with sweat. The other women wore only their small clothes, as did the men while they exercised in the heat. Bellia took off her two amulets when they fought. It seemed that the crew tolerated the women, but only jeered at the two men. When Bellia sparred with Yezza or Menna, the crew paused to see the swords fly.
“We came in to Eustia about twenty leagues north of the estuary,” the captain explained to Menna. We’ll enter the Ballut River by morning in two days, then it’s another fifty leagues up to Palubat.”
Menna turned to her sweating crew. “Five more days on this bucket. It’s time to bring out the map again. Wash yourselves off first. I’ll be back.” Menna dumped a bucket of seawater over herself and began to wipe the brine off her body as she went back to the cabin.
Bellia liked the seawater rinse. The air was hot and she’d rather be cooled off by something a bit cleaner than the wind drying off her sweat.
Yezza put two buckets over her. This time, she let her dark hair out of its long single braid and rubbed at it as one of her men poured more water over her head. She looked younger when her hair was wet. That’s when she could see how beautiful she must have been before hardness worked its way onto her face.
Bellia wondered how she would look in twenty years time. That made her shiver, despite the heat.
Menna brought up the Bellia’s paper copy of the original. She grabbed a belaying pin and pulled out her knife to keep the document from blowing away.
Bellia made a practice of reading from the document as if she hadn’t memorized it.
“Let’s go through the instructions again. In a few days, we’ll have to buy all of our supplies in Palubat.”
For the next two afternoons, Bellia read and re-read passages of the parchment. If the others had
n’t memorized it by the time the ship docked, she’d be surprised. Despite the many times reviewing the instructions, the curse still remained an elusive question.
“We’re ready to go.” Menna nearly danced on the deck, she was so anxious to get off the ship. Once their supplies were on horses and they would head southwest towards the legendary Helevat, Bellia doubted any of them would be able to sleep.
They walked the streets of Palubat. Bellia noticed the sign of a healer. She remembered reading boring dispatches from this town. “I’m going in here. This healer might be a Servant of the Temple and give us some local knowledge.”
Menna let her go. “All the knowledge I need is here.” She patted her saddlebag where the parchment and its copy were.
Bellia walked into the dim lobby. Magic-enhanced coolness washed over her like frigid water. She shivered in the empty room. A bell sat on a short counter. Before she could ring it, a woman walked in.
“I’d like to see the healer.”
“You are seeing the healer,” the woman said. “You are surprised I am a woman?”
“Yes. I’m Bellia and you are?”
“My name is Lily.”
“Your dispatches to the Temple were always signed ‘L’.”
“You are a servant?” She clutched her fists to her bosom in excitement.
“I was for a time. I worked in the Assessment room for more than six months. It was my pleasure to see a few of your letters.”
“Did any make it to the Readers?” She looked brightly into Bellia’s eyes. The woman was probably sixty. Her hair had gone white. She had clear skin with a fine net of wrinkles radiating from the corners of her eyes and the edges of her lips when she smiled.
“I’m sure bits and pieces, but not all. Rarely is all of a dispatch passed on.”
“I do my part for the Blind God.” She sighed. “What brings you to Palubat?”
“Can we sit?”
She brought her back to her workroom and they both sat down facing the healer’s table.
