the Year the Horses came

by Mary Mackey

  Rhom chuckled. "My dear sisters have no ear for poetry." He waved at them. "Permit me to introduce Zastra and Shema, two of the most practical women ever to walk the forest trail." To Marrah's surprise, the women immediately stopped packing the baskets and hurried across the room to kiss her hand. Hand kissing must be a southern custom, she decided.

  "Her peace be with you," Zastra and Shema said politely, rolling the ends of their words in a way she had never heard before. They were clearly sisters, big and broad-shouldered, with stocky arms and legs that looked strong enough to carry baskets twice as heavy as the ones they were packing. Both wore their hair braided up and out of the way, and both had the same flattish noses and clear brown eyes. Except for the fact that Zastra was clearly several years older than Shema, they might have been twins.

  Rhom, in contrast, was light-boned and thin, with dark eyes, graceful hands, and small feet. Everything about him seemed exotic to Marrah, from the finely embroidered piece of linen he wore cinched around his waist to the intricate weave of his sandals. If he hadn't had the same flat nose as his sisters, she would have had trouble believing the three were related. She wondered how such a small man had managed to carry a basket filled with trade goods from one sea to the other. Rhom looked as if he'd wilt under a medium-sized load of firewood.

  As if reading her thoughts, he walked across the room and picked up one of the baskets. "This one's for you," he said, motioning for her to turn around so he could help her into the straps. Since he was lifting the basket with one hand, she assumed it was almost empty, but when he put it on her it was so heavy she staggered and nearly fell over backward.

  Shema caught her and helped her out of the basket. "I told Rhom it would be too heavy for you, but he never listens to me." She patted Marrah on the arm sympathetically. "Don't worry little sister. We'll make you and your brother beginners' baskets. The giant who's traveling with you can pack a full load, but all you'll have to carry are the feather capes and straw bird masks and your own food." Zastra and Rhom nodded in agreement.

  Marrah's pride was smarting, but she had enough sense not to argue. She looked at Rhom with new respect. She had always thought of herself as strong for her size, but compared to him and his sisters, she was a weakling.

  The next morning the six of them left Gurasoak before the breakfast fires were lit. It was a cool, still time of day, and as Marrah put her back to the Sea of Gray Waves and walked toward the estuary, she felt as if she were entering a new world. The estuary was a large tidal basin, part salt water, part fresh. At dawn and dusk, thousands of frogs ribbeted and droned from invisible hiding places in the reeds. The Shore People called the river that fed the estuary Ibai Nabar, or the River of Many Colors, because its wide, calm surface reflected the sky, changing from dark gray to shell pink as the sun rose. At noon, the estuary shone like a sheet of ice, but in the mornings and late afternoons, on a clear day, it took on a transparent blue tint that reminded her of Stavan's eyes.

  Yet as beautiful as the estuary was, it was no pleasure to walk along its banks, especially if you were carrying a basket full of trade goods. Ringed by marshes and bogs, it was treacherous, ankle-spraining country; the mud was waist deep in places, and it wasn't unheard of for trading parties to spend a week or more making their way up to the mouth of the river.

  But thanks to Mother Asha, Marrah, Stavan, Arang, and the traders left Gurasoak in style, floating past the muddy shore in two small round shavas. Made out of pieces of cowhide stretched on wicker frames and sealed with pitch, the light, watertight boats could be found in every village of the Shore People. Marrah knew them well, having fished from one ever since she was old enough to hold a pole. They were hard to tip over but even harder to steer, and although they could hold their own in calm water and move briskly forward when the tide was with you, they were almost useless against a current.

  Since the tide was coming in, they would have presented no problem if Stavan and the traders had known how to steer them, but they didn't. At first they went in circles as Rhom and Stavan cursed and Shema and Zastra floundered on grimly. Finally Marrah took over and showed them all how it was done, and after that they made steady progress, stopping whenever the tide turned and camping on whatever dry land they could find.

  On the second night it rained. Turning the shavas upside down, they used them as shelters. They had to take turns sleeping since there wasn't enough room under the boats for all six of them plus the trading baskets, but the rain was warm and the traders made it clear that if anything got wet it was not going to be the straw bird masks and feathered capes.

  The next morning they set out again, paddling across the estuary under a sun that quickly dried their clothes. It was a lovely, lazy way to travel, and as Marrah dipped her paddle into the great mirror beneath her she felt at peace for the first time since she left Xori. Protected from the strong winds and winter storms of the coast, the estuary was home to thousands of birds of every kind — herons, bitterns, goldeneyes, grebes, kestrels, rails, kingfishers, and black-headed gulls so fat from feasting in the wild grasses they could hardly fly. Sometimes, as the shavas passed, huge flocks of mallards would rise into the air uttering cries of alarm. There were so many that the flapping of their wings rippled the surface of the water, and for a moment or two their bodies would blot out the sun. But for the most part, the birds regarded them with indifference, hardly pausing long enough to look at the passing boats before they went back to feeding on the fish and wild grasses. It was clear they had never been hunted and had no fear of human beings; if Marrah had wanted to, she could have reached out and caught one with her bare hands. But there was no need to teach the birds their trust was misplaced. The waters of the estuary were so full of fish that in the mornings they always caught enough to eat well for the rest of the day.

  Around noon on the third day, the landscape began to change. First a few trees appeared along the banks, then more. The water became clearer and took on a slightly green tinge, and the tall grasses gave way to islands covered with bushes and saplings. By the time the shadows had begun to lengthen again, the current coming toward them had grown so strong it was impossible to paddle the shavas, so they hauled the boats out of the water and carried them like great baskets to the end of the estuary, cursing as they stumbled through the muck. Soon they came to the mouth of the river. Actually it wasn't one river but two, separated by what appeared to be an island. The island was really the northern bank of the Ibai Nabar, and Marrah was amused to learn that the river to the left was called the Ibai Txar, or "Wrong River," named no doubt by some disgruntled trading party that had taken it by mistake.

  Hoisting the shavas up onto the southern bank of the Ibai Nabar, they washed as much mud off themselves as they could and then set out again, carrying the boats upriver toward the little village of Xemta, which the traders assured them lay nearby. Xemta was either the last settlement of the Shore People or the first of the River People, depending on how you felt about it, but since the entire village only consisted of two longhouses about the size of cow sheds and several garden plots barely large enough to sustain the single mother family that tilled them, it hardly mattered. According to Rhom, the women of Xemta had made children with the men of the Shore and the men of the River as long as anyone could remember, but it was quite a trip in both directions, and they were always happy to extend hospitality to traders, especially male traders.

  Shema and Zastra shook their heads at this but admitted Rhom was telling the truth. "They're all one mother family," Zastra explained, "so of course they can't share joy with each other. The sons usually leave the village when they get old enough to want a woman, but since the daughters belong to the land, they stay put. Any man who's alive and breathing can always find a warm bed in Xemta — even Rhom."

  Marrah didn't think this was much of a compliment to Rhom, but he seemed to take the teasing with good humor. She was gradually beginning to realize he was harmless. The elaborate flattery he tossed her way
was not meant to be taken seriously; it was just his way of amusing himself, and once she had made it clear that she wasn't interested in sharing his bed, he had settled down and become as sensible a traveling companion as anyone could ask for.

  Stavan, on the other hand, worried her. He never complained, but he could hardly be described as cheerful. Ever since they left Xori, he had barely spoken to her, and she often caught him looking at her in a way that made her feel uneasy. If he hadn't been so polite and helpful, she would have thought he had somehow guessed he was being taken to Shara as a living example of the beastmen, but he was treating her with so much respect that every time he spoke to her she felt like the Mother-of-All-Families, which might have been pleasant if she had been ninety and toothless, but given that she was young and had all her teeth, she would have preferred he talk to her more like he talked to Arang. Those conversations were mostly about hunting, but they were animated. Stavan had brought his arrows and his brother's strangely shaped bow along, and from what Marrah had overheard, he was planning to show Arang how to hunt once they entered the forest.

  Sometimes she wondered if perhaps she was the one who was being unfriendly. She was doing her best to remember that Stavan's people were the problem, not Stavan, but sometimes, when she looked at him, she couldn't help imagining him mounted on one of those beasts he called horses. She would think of burning cities and people fleeing in panic and other things so terrible she tried not to dwell on them. Sometimes she would even find herself blaming him for the fact that she had to leave Xori. She missed her mother and Bere and Ama and Uncle Seme so much she often had to bite her lips to keep from crying in front of Arang, and although she knew it was unfair, she couldn't help feeling that if it weren't for Stavan she would be at home now, eating Uncle Hatz's stew and sleeping in her own bed.

  Whenever she fell into one of these moods, she took special pains to be friendly to Stavan, but perhaps he sensed that her friendliness was mixed with resentment. She hoped not, because they were going to be in each other's company for a long time and it was important to get along. Besides, she had grown to like him over the past few weeks, and when she was in a more sensible frame of mind she knew he deserved to be treated as a friend. It was a difficult situation, and that afternoon as they headed upriver she was relieved to find herself sharing a boat with Zastra and Shema.

  Marrah might have been even more uneasy if she had known what was going on in Stavan's mind as he, Arang, and Rhom hauled their boat through the brush. Stavan was not unhappy — she was wrong about that — but he was not particularly happy either. Instead, he was caught somewhere in between. He was glad to be leaving the land of the Shore People. He had never liked the cold mists and gray sea, and although he had begun to appreciate some of their customs, he felt trapped between the beach and the forest. He had never stopped longing for the endless horizons of the Sea of Grass, and ever since Achan led him west he had dreamed of going home. Now, at last, he was on his way, moving more or less in the right direction, not mounted on a horse as a man should be, but at least walking on his own two feet instead of tossing around in one of the savages' cursed little boats, the kind that floundered and broke apart like kindling in rough weather.

  Yet at the same time he was worried. For one thing, there was no guarantee he would be able to find the tents of the Hansi even if he did manage to get back to the steppes. The tribe moved constantly over an area so large that only Han knew where they were camping at any given moment. Even supposing he picked up their trail before he died of exhaustion or was killed by enemy warriors, what kind of reception would his father give him when he returned on foot to report that Achan was dead and the whole expedition to the Land of the Sun a miserable failure?

  All that would have been enough to keep him awake at night, but there was something else bothering him, something he couldn't quite put his finger on. It had something to do with Marrah, but he couldn't say exactly what. Ordinarily when he thought about a woman, he knew exactly how he felt: he either wanted to take her into his bed or he didn't, and that was all there was to it. There were exceptions, of course, women like Tzinta, who had raised him and was practically a mother to him, and who had more spirit and more fine tales to tell than most men, or Zulike, his father's wife, who had enough power to cause a man a lot of trouble if she put her mind to it; but for the most part, when he was with a woman he knew what to do with her — or, for that matter, what not to do with her if she belonged to another man.

  But with Marrah things had somehow managed to get so snarled up he hardly ever knew from one morning to the next how to treat her. In the Sea of Grass, the problem wouldn't have existed. He could have bought her from her father or brother for a few head of cattle if he'd desired her, and after that she would have been expected to serve him, bear his children, and keep silent when he spoke. She would have been a possession — treasured, perhaps, but always inferior to him the way even the finest mare was inferior to the man who rode her. And if he hadn't desired her, she would have never dared to speak to him. When he passed, she would have cast down her eyes, drawn her shawl across her face, and bowed to him even though he was only the Great Chief's son by a concubine, and he would barely have been aware of her existence except when he summoned her to bring him water or put more wood on the fire.

  But Marrah would no more cast down her eyes modestly and bring him a cup of water than a she-wolf. She was not only no man's wife, she didn't even have a father, at least not one she recognized, and as far as he could tell, her idea of treating a man properly was to invite him to sleep with her. He had seen her at Hoza after the pole dance shamelessly embracing a man from some other village, and later, when they'd returned to Xori, he'd gradually become aware that she was going off into the woods with Bere — not that he cared, not that he was jealous — and as far as he could tell, her people thought it was perfectly normal for a young woman to have as many lovers as she wanted. By Han, they not only thought it was normal, they thought it was her religious duty!

  He had to admit he liked the idea of sex as a religious duty, but where did that leave him with regard to Marrah? He had better decide, and soon too, because he was going to be traveling with her for the better part of a year, and maybe longer if she and her brother needed him, because when he'd vowed to protect her and her family, he hadn't put any time limit on the promise.

  He shook his head and took a quick look over his shoulder at Marrah and the two women traders. Only their feet were visible because they had turned their boat upside down and were walking under it as if it were a giant sunshade, laughing and talking to one another as they picked their way along the riverbank. The situation wouldn't have been so confusing if Marrah hadn't saved his life, but she had, and by doing so she had become the equivalent of his chief. He had pledged his loyalty to her the way he would have pledged it to another warrior, but how did you treat your chief when she also happened to be a pretty, stubborn young woman who did whatever she pleased?

  Not that he had any regrets. Under the circumstances, it had been the only honorable thing to do, and he had no intention of breaking his vow; but it was all so...confusing. Worse yet, it was making him want her. He didn't want to desire Marrah, and he could see it was going to cause all sorts of complications, but he couldn't seem to put her out of his thoughts. He was starting to feel about her the way he had felt about Jallate, Vlahan's wife, when he was a boy. Maybe he was cursed with a liking for inaccessible women.

  Well, he wasn't a boy any longer, and he knew how to keep silent, which was exactly what he was going to do until this unwanted desire ran its course. He'd treat Marrah as his chief and do his best to forget she was a woman.

  He tightened his grip on the rim of the shava and looked at the river, trying to calculate how far they had walked. The water rolled by, rippling like the muscles on the back of a mare, so green and dear he could see fish swimming along the bank. Behind him, he heard the sound of Marrah's laughter.

  In the early aft
ernoon they reached Xemta, where, as Rhom had promised, they received a warm welcome. Thanks to their pilgrim necklaces, Marrah and Arang were given a whole sleeping compartment to themselves; Zastra, Shema, and Stavan made themselves comfortable under the overhanging eves of the front porch of one of the longhouses, and Rhom disappeared into the forest with the second youngest granddaughter of the village mother, a dark-haired young woman named Koipa who rushed down the trail to greet him, whooping with joy as soon as she saw him step into the clearing. Presumably Koipa had run to be first in line, since there were four other granddaughters who showed similar enthusiasm at the sight of Rhom. Because of his white hair and beard, Stavan was initially mistaken for a very old man by the lustful women of Xemta, who quickly realized their error. Winking and blowing him kisses, they did their best to entice him, but Stavan ignored them and went down to the river to take a swim. That was too much for the granddaughters, who followed him and sat on the bank, laughing and calling out invitations until he waved them away brusquely as if embarrassed. After that, they left him alone, since it would have been inhospitable to go on pestering a man after he'd refused, but there were a lot of long faces at dinner that night, and a good number of longing looks.

  The next morning they left the boats behind to be ferried back to Gurasoak, shouldered the carrying baskets, and set off on foot, following the river. At first the path ran close to the water, but soon it turned away and they were forced to struggle up a muddy slope toward the forest, where, Rhom assured them, the going would be easier.

  Shema and Zastra agreed. "This is the third time we've made the forest crossing in this direction," Zastra said, "and believe me, it's almost always easier to walk in the forest, not to mention that in a couple of weeks you'll have eaten so much food out of your baskets you'll hardly know they're on your back."