The Black Wolves

by Kate Elliott

  Farihosh set his left hand flat on the center of the map to hide something. He smiled in the cordial way he had that invited you in but cut you off before you got too close. “No communication. My apologies, Lord Gilaras. I hope you find the expedition to your taste, now that you are embarked upon it.”

  Gil took the hint and returned to the table, where Tyras had started snoring. He snagged the last jellied bean paste and popped it in his mouth as Farihosh sheathed the map and the guards started taking the table apart for transport. “We’re not riding north to Toskala, are we? We’re riding south into the empire. Queen Chorannah is taking sides in the succession war.”

  54

  Sarai crept down an unlit lane in the city of Nessumara and halted by the servants’ gate of the house where she had been born. Beside the latchless gate hung a cord. She tugged on it to release the muted thunk of a padded bell.

  Silence greeted her. She glanced back the way she had come, but no one had followed her. Once they had transferred from the riverboat to an oceangoing ship bound for Salya, their new captain had told his fugitive passengers that the tide waited for no one. She had coordinated her departure so there wouldn’t be opportunity to search for her before the ship had to sail.

  Just as she thought she must tug the cord again, footsteps pattered up and a slit opened. A woman peered through, Hundred-born by her round eyes and dark skin, and examined Sarai’s humble cotton taloos and the faded shawl draped over her hair.

  “We have no deliveries engaged for this hour. What do you want?”

  Sarai leaned closer to allow the lamplight to illuminate her face.

  The woman recoiled, then swayed back into view. “Who are you?”

  “I am here to see Master Aram.”

  “Aui! Aram Elder?”

  Here came the crux of it. “Aram Elder still lives, does he not?”

  The servant glanced over her shoulder, then back at Sarai. “Of course. He still rules this house.”

  “It is his son I seek, Aram Younger. I beg you, please tell him his sister is here.”

  “You are not his sister. His sisters are either married or still living at home. Are you a counterfeiter’s daughter, with those eyes and that skin? It wouldn’t surprise me. Come to extort coin from one of our men.”

  “Please, verea. That isn’t my purpose here. If Aram Younger refuses then nothing changes.”

  “But I have to walk all the way and back again.”

  “You will have his thanks for it.”

  The servant shook her head in a way that made Sarai fear she was about to rebuff her. “No harm in telling him, I suppose, not that your wiles will have any luck with Aram Younger. He’s a good man.”

  The shutter slammed closed. Footsteps pattered away. Sarai shifted from foot to foot. “A counterfeiter’s daughter.” The word whore did not exist in the language of the Hundred, the closest being flower girl. Among the Ri Amarah the description of a woman giving her husband false coin fit well enough.

  The solidity of the land felt strange after days on the river. Nessumara had smoky, humid air and a reek that made her ill. She hid her face in her hands. Her palms were hot and her cheeks were hotter.

  A cart turned down the street. She crept deeper into the shadows along the compound wall, but the man pushed the cart past her without a word or glance. It hadn’t been easy to sneak off; the people of Five Roads Clan had been so kind on the river trip, treating her as an honored guest, even giving her a comb they could ill afford to lose. But she wasn’t one of them, and anyway she was tired of having her future arranged by other people. If her brother refused to see her then she would try to get work as a clerk. People kept records going back many years. Somewhere in Nessumara’s transport district she might find a trace of the failed conspiracy and the fate of a carter named Isar.

  “Sarai?”

  The sound of her name pronounced in the proper way jolted her. She pressed her hands against the door. Eyes she did not know stared at her through the narrow opening: long lashes, thick brows, a pale forehead.

  “Aram? Are you my brother Aram?”

  The shutter banged shut, the noise a slap to her heart.

  Locked out.

  Rejected again.

  Bars scraped, and the door swung in. Because she was still leaning against it, she stumbled inside. The young man caught her arm and guided her to a bench. A young Ri Amarah woman closed and barred the door, then knelt before her. Her clothes had the starch of wealth but her face was relaxed and merry.

  “Is this truly her, Aram? You look a bit alike. See, it is the scar they mention.”

  He stood with a hand on his chest as if stanching a wound to the heart.

  “It is truly you, my sister,” he said in a voice deeper than she expected, almost rumbling. He sat on the bench with a thump. How he stared! “I remember when you were born, not long before our mother ran away. Those first few months she used to let me hold you. She would say, ‘Little colt, she is the most precious of your charges and you must protect her always’…” He swallowed.

  “Little colt?”

  He wiped his eyes and went on. “Little colt was the pet name she called me. Like in the Tale of Trusted.”

  “I’ll keep watch.” The woman moved away into the shadows.

  Sarai and Aram sat in an entry court that let onto a portico and, beyond it, a lane leading between storehouses. After the evening brightness of the upper palace where lamps burned incessantly, the courtyard had the dim aura of a frugal household held on a tight leash. Not even kitchen noises disturbed them, no levity, no evening laughter and singing.

  “That’s a children’s story,” Sarai said.

  “It was my favorite story when I was a little boy. Mama told it to me every night at bedtime. It’s my only real memory of her.” He intoned the words. “In the days of old, when the eldest of the ancestors were children your own age, there was a fine and splendid horse whose name was Trusted. He was the favorite steed of the Imperators of Gems and Knives, the ones who rule half the world. But one day Trusted discovered that the Imperators were cruel people.”

  “No one ever told me this story at bedtime when I was a little girl.”

  “No one told you?”

  “Great-Aunt Tsania told me stories of how flowers propagate and how we measure the passing of seasons by the position of the sun as it rises and sets. I was the only child actually raised at the estate even though the family always came up to spend the hottest month in the hills. So the tales I heard were the ones told by the local women who worked in the house. I grew up hearing the tales of the Hundred, not Ri Amarah tales. What did the Imperators do that was so cruel?” she asked, caught by the mystery of the tale and its quiet insight into the life her mother had fled.

  “With magic the Imperators cut out the free heart of our people and turned them into slaves.”

  “How can magic cut out people’s hearts? Wouldn’t a scalpel be better?”

  His smile brushed like balm over her heart. “I always asked that question, too, although not the part about the scalpel. Then she would say, ‘Little colt, when you have taken a man’s place in the hall you will hear the full tale.’ Now shall I go on?”

  “Yes,” said Sarai, leaning toward him and, trustingly, he took her hand in his. It seemed to her he went on because once started he had to tell the whole story before he could stop, as if the ritual was itself the memory of a mother he had lost when he was only five.

  “Trusted went to his mother, the mare who gave birth to the world, and he told her of what he had learned. ‘Little colt,’ his mother the mare said to him, ‘you are strong and bold and you must lead your people away from the Imperators and never return. You must steal the bridle of gold and the saddle of jewels with which the Imperators harness you so you can never be called back. But remember that once you have stolen the bridle and the saddle you can never put them on no matter how beautiful you look in them because if you do, the Imperators will know where you are and
the magic will awaken and you will be dragged back to their stable.’”

  Again he wiped fingers across his eyes and let out a breath.

  “She told me the story so many times we had made a game of it. After she mentioned being dragged back to the Imperators’ stable, I would always ask, ‘But what about you, Mother Mare? Will you not escape with me and the others to a safe place?’”

  Again he paused, then sighed.

  “Ai! It is so hard to say the words. She told me the story that night, that last night, because she wanted me to lie down and sleep. She said, ‘Little colt, you are the trusted one whom the others will follow. I am the mare who birthed the world. I must stand astride the world and shelter all. We will part here and now, but know I am always with you, my dear son. My dear son. Know I am always with you.’

  “But she was crying as she spoke. I asked her why she was crying and she said, ‘These are not tears, they are starlight fallen to earth.’” He touched fingers to his lips as in imitation of the last time she had touched his. “‘Starlight tastes salty, like the sea, because starlight is the path Trusted took across the wide ocean, he and all the herd who fled from the cruel Imperators.’”

  He paused.

  Sarai could not speak.

  With a sigh, he went on in a quiet voice. “And that is the end of the story. She told me to close my eyes and sleep until morning.”

  For the longest time they looked at each other, strangers who had once been bound so closely, travelers out of the same womb. His confident air had the grace of a young man raised to expect he will one day be among the authoritative men of the house. But caution and a hint of fear brushed him with humility.

  “You never saw her again?”

  He glanced around as if seeking eavesdroppers. “I knew something was wrong. I pretended to be asleep and watched her. Instead of tucking you into your cradle as she usually did, she bundled you into a sling and grabbed a laden pouch and left our suite of rooms. I followed her.”

  “Where did she go?”

  “Up the tower to where the holy flame lies hidden from the eyes of men. I should not have followed but I was so afraid. I saw a thing I ought never to have seen. Women’s magic.” He glanced in the direction his wife had walked, but the shadows hid her. Then he whispered, “She lifted the seal—the cap—off the vessel and laid the mirror across the mouth. The holy flame leaped up to catch in the surface of her mirror. The brilliance lit her face, and yours in her arms. She looked into its reflection. And then she was gone.”

  “Gone? Vanished?” She thought of the demon’s coil.

  “No. Whatever she saw in her mirror made her leave the house. I hid because I knew men aren’t allowed in the tower and I didn’t want her to see me and know I had broken our law. She never came back but my father returned unexpectedly later that night. He had been gone for six months on a trading mission. When he had left, you hadn’t yet been born.”

  “He had never seen me?”

  “No, you were born after he departed. It was many years before I understood she ran away because she didn’t want him to see you, because if he did then he would know…”

  He trailed off, a frown troubling his kind features.

  “That I am a counterfeiter’s daughter. It’s no surprise to me what I am, Aram. You need not fear to say it.”

  He squeezed her hands. “If you had been his child they would have brought you back here instead of sending you to the country estate of our mother’s clan. But you are another man’s child, and that he would never, ever forgive.”

  Silence fell between them, yet she felt comforted by the ease with which they could reflect together on how they had been torn apart so many years ago. After a bit he said, “Why have you come, Sarai? We heard you are to marry Prince Tavahosh.”

  “That’s why I ran away. I’m pregnant with Lord Gilaras’s child. I don’t want to marry Prince Tavahosh.”

  The young woman raced out of the shadows as if she had been listening all along. Again she knelt before Sarai. This time she grasped Sarai’s hands. The pleasing features of her round face and the warm contours of her smile wormed their way right into Sarai’s heart. “You’ll live with us! We will be sisters. Our children will call you Aunt and your child will be their cousin.”

  “Hush, Jiara,” Aram said with an affectionate touch to his wife’s shoulder. “I would have had Sarai brought here years ago but it isn’t safe for her.”

  “He’s old and failing. By the grace of the Hidden One, he will die soon.”

  “Don’t say so. It’s ill luck upon all of us to wish death even upon the wicked.”

  “People do it all the time! Anyway it’s true and you know it. Your father has been the ill wind that plagues the house. Five wives he has had, Aram! Three lie in the tomb, and your mother fled her own people and abandoned a son she loved to escape him. Even then death claimed her. It is only this last wife he does not beat and abuse, so we are told. The honest women will vote with me to demand the men’s council cast lots on whether to keep him as headman of the house. But I can only call a vote once. If I do, you must back me up in the men’s council. If enough men mark their tokens, then your father will no longer be headman. Sarai’s arrival is the sign that now is the time to remove him. His hate and anger harm us all. You know it.”

  “Yes, yes, I know it, none better than me who lost my mother,” he breathed.

  “Do you have enough support on the men’s council to unseat him?”

  “The other men fear him.”

  “When will we stop fearing him and act?”

  Sarai got to her feet. “I can’t come here only to cause trouble for you. It’s better if I go.”

  Jiara dragged her to a halt. “Where would you go? Who will keep you?”

  “There’s a ship,” she lied, knowing the tide had already turned.

  “Is there really a ship?” Aram touched a finger to her nose in a gesture that seemed so right and so familiar that she sagged into his embrace. “I used to touch your nose like that, and then you would laugh. You had the sweetest little chortle, like babies do. I never forgot it. Don’t leave us, Sarai. Jiara is right. We have let things go on for too long. I’ve been too timid. My father is a terrible man. It is time he be retired to the elders’ council so a more respectable and even-tempered man can stand in authority over the house.”

  “But what about the other people who live here? They need only look at my face to know me for what I am, a counterfeiter’s daughter.”

  “Do not underestimate my influence.” He raised his arms to display bracelets all the way to his elbow, like those of a much older man. “I am young but I have accomplished a great deal. I opened a new trade route over the ocean by negotiating with the Tandi consortium to convince them to establish a trading hall here in Nessumara. Please let me do what our mother charged me with. Let me protect you, as I should have had the courage to do long before this.”

  How her heart trembled.

  “I’ll take Sarai to the sacred flame where your father can’t go,” said Jiara. “We have to act quickly before he guesses you mean to unseat him.”

  Aram had a face as transparent as glass, easy to read as he worked from trepidation through consideration to compassion and conviction. “Yes. We’ll do it now.”

  They walked past the empty kitchen and locked storerooms and along a portico. From there Aram directed her into the long atrium that in every Ri Amarah compound divided the men’s wing from the women’s wing, with the tower at the far end. No lights shone in the women’s hall, not as they would have at home when all the cousins were visiting. How odd to think she missed the chatter, and had taken it for granted. In this house some of the men had stayed late at prayer, voices rising in somber melodies. The heavy sonority of their voices coursed through every part of her being, the comforting prayers of her childhood melding with apprehension to make each step seem poised over a chasm.

  “Aram, I’ll take her up while you go and speak to your al
lies.” He hurried away to the men’s wing. Jiara gave a stealthy glance around as they slipped into the tower. “Step where I step so you don’t make the stairs creak.”

  They passed the first landing that let onto the room where women kept the accounts and ledgers. They paused for Sarai to catch her breath on the second landing that let onto the Master’s Study. A vile taint drifted like bitter incense from behind the closed and locked door. Queasiness roiled her stomach, and she hurried after Jiara up the last flight to the top floor.

  The last time she had stood in the women’s tower she had overheard the argument between Makel and Abrisho that had catapulted her into a new life. Into this life. Every Ri Amarah tower held a sacred flame contained in a glass vessel. At their entrance the quiescent flames stirred, licking up the sides as if in response to their presence. Gouts of thready blue fire probed the sealed lid and fell back.

  Her heart would not cease thumping.

  “Sit now. You’re out of breath.” Jiara urged her onto a cushion and settled beside her. “Is it really true you were offered marriage to Prince Tavahosh? And rejected it?”

  “It is.”

  “How was your other husband?”

  “I like him.”

  Jiara hissed breath through pursed lips. “It’s surprising you were allowed to marry out at all.”

  “Not really. They never thought of me as truly Ri Amarah.”

  “It’s true anyone can see by looking at you that your mother shamed herself.”

  “Why is it shame for her if it would not be shame for a man to do the same thing? Why is it shame for her to find affection elsewhere if she was married to a man who abused her? You said yourself that Aram Elder has had five wives, and four of them are dead! He gets away with it because he is rich and powerful.”

  Jiara touched her gold hoop earrings. “Aram Elder gets away with it because all of us around him benefit from his wealth and power. It’s easier to look the other way.”