the Year the Horses came

by Mary Mackey

  When the cheering had died down a little, Changar turned and motioned for the horses to be brought to him. Even Marrah could tell they were exceptionally fine: five mares and five young stallions, all strong and fit and clear-eyed, with glossy coats and manes plaited with bits of red thread. They had been hobbled so they wouldn't bolt through the crowd, but there was still something wild and beautiful about them. They had the look of animals that had never been tamed.

  When the horses were in place, Changar stood absolutely still for a few moments. Perhaps he was admiring the animals, or perhaps he was talking to one of his gods. In any case, it was clear by now that he was about to perform some kind of important religious ceremony.

  After a while, he approached the horses and began to speak to them in their own language, whinnying softly and stroking their heaving sides. The horses' eyes were wide with fright and several of them had their ears laid back against their heads, but at the touch of his hand they relaxed. Marrah was surprised to see how gentle he was with the beasts. He cooed to them like a lover and sang to them like a mother.

  But his gentleness was all pretense. When the horses had stopped struggling, he said something in a low voice, and two of the sun warriors stepped forward and handed him their daggers. They were wicked-looking weapons with hilts worked in copper and bone blades edged with flint. Changar stuck one dagger in the earth — the sign of Han, Marrah recalled. The other he held by the hilt, close to his side where the horses couldn't see it.

  After that there were some prayers, some songs, even some chanting done in a low drone that raised the hair on her arms, but for a long time nothing else happened. Then suddenly Changar walked over to the nearest horse and slit its throat. Before the poor animal had fallen — before Marrah had time to scream or the crowd had time to cheer — he had passed to the next horse and killed it too. On he went down the line, moving so swiftly he seemed to fly, and every time his dagger touched horsehide, blood gushed onto the ground. The poor beasts bucked and screamed and tried to kick, but they had been well hobbled and not one escaped. When all ten lay in the dust bleeding to death, Changar seized the skull drinking cup and filled it from their throats like a man filling a jar from a fountain.

  She wanted to turn away from the sight of that bloody cup, but she couldn't. The only animal she had ever seen sacrificed was the she-goat Stavan had killed over his brother's grave, but that had been nothing compared to this. This was a massacre; it was like Shambah all over again, only this time defenseless horses had died instead of defenseless people.

  She had the feeling that she was being given a look into the hearts of the nomads, and what she saw made her sick with fear. There hadn't been any need to kill those horses. No one was hungry; no one needed their hides to patch a tent. Ten beautiful animals had died, screaming and terrified, because the Hansi thought their god liked to see his creatures suffer. Because of some terrible sin they had committed in the past, the nomads had forgotten that the Earth was their Mother and the animals were their brothers and sisters. They believed they were all alone in the world, and their loneliness had made them insane.

  The insanity of that loneliness glowed in Zuhan's eyes as he took the skull cup from Changar. It was in his face as he pulled out his own dagger, made two shallow cuts in his upper arm, and mixed his blood with the blood of the horses. It was even in his hands as he lifted the cup to his lips, took a long drink, and then passed the cup on to Arang.

  Arang stared at the bloody skull with fear and disgust. He looked as if he might vomit, but somehow he managed to raise it to his lips. Marrah couldn't bear to watch him drink. This time she closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, he had a smear of red around his mouth and Changar was striding toward him looking displeased. With a grunt of disapproval he seized Arang's arm, pushed up his sleeve, and cut him just below the elbow so that Arang too bled into the cup. Arang flinched but didn't cry out. His eyes grew round and his lips turned pale, but he held his ground, and Marrah was proud of him.

  Changar passed the cup to Zuhan again, and Zuhan drank and passed it back to Arang. Once again, Arang was forced to take a sip of blood, and as he did so, the crowd cheered.

  "Achan! Zuhan!"

  "Zuhan! Achan!"

  "Han, Han, Han!"

  The drums took up the beat; the cheer became a chant. Zuhan rose to his feet, embraced Arang, and kissed him formally on both cheeks.

  "Hansi!" the crowd chanted. "Hansi! Hansi!"

  Arang looked close to tears. He faced the crowd and tried to smile, but his lips trembled. The nomads didn't seem to notice, or if they noticed they didn't care. They just went on yelling the word "Hansi" until Marrah wanted to stuff her fingers in her ears. Arang was theirs — whether he wanted to be or not.

  After that she expected more horrors, but to her unspeakable relief nothing terrible happened. Perhaps Zuhan had changed his mind about marrying her to Vlahan, or perhaps she'd simply been forgotten in all the excitement, but in any event no one paid any attention to her. The adoption ceremony went on for a little while longer, and then suddenly the drumming stopped and everyone began to mill around. Arang was surrounded by a crowd of well-wishers, men mostly, but a few older women who kissed him on the cheeks just as Zuhan had done. For some reason they wouldn't let her anywhere near him, but since he didn't seem to be in any immediate danger, she relaxed. After a while, women appeared with skins of chilled kersek, and the warriors helped themselves. It looked as if they had a long night of drinking ahead of them.

  She waited patiently, trying to make herself as inconspicuous as possible, and when the sky had turned the color of bleached bone, she walked back toward the camp with a crowd of dancing, singing women. It was still light enough to see, but some of them carried small tallow candles that flickered in the dusk. The wind had died down and the dust had settled, but the dancers soon stirred it up again.

  Now that the adoption was over, Marrah felt more hopeful. The sacrifice of the horses had been horrible and Arang had been forced to do disgusting things, but he had come through in one piece, as had she. Neither of them was dead or married to a stranger. In the land of the nomads that was about as much as a person could ask for.

  She looked at the tall grasses and the pale sky. There was a peace to the steppes, especially just after sunset. Everything seemed to be holding its breath, waiting for the stars to appear. To her left, a small flock of sheep huddled together in a woolly ball.

  All at once, she realized why it was so quiet. The women had stopped singing. Now that's strange, she thought, but before she had a chance to understand, there was a sudden clatter of hooves, and the women on each side of her scattered. There was no other warning. She simply looked up and saw a warrior swooping down on her, and before she could yell or run he grabbed her and pulled her up on his horse. He was a big man in his late twenties, red-bearded, with long brown hair, a flat nose, fleshy cheeks, and a cruel, sensual mouth.

  She yelled and fought as he pulled her toward him, but he only looked amused. He was strong, and his fingers bit into her shoulders like stone. "cagk," he ordered, and at the sound of that word, which she knew by now meant "give up" and "give in," she went half crazy.

  "Let go of me!" she screamed. "I'm Arang's aunt! Zuhan will punish you for touching me!" But what did he care what she said? He couldn't understand a word, and besides Zuhan himself had given her to him. He was Vlahan; she could see it in his eyes and in the way he held her as if he owned her. Mare, cow, ewe, those eyes said. She-goat, pretty little colt, cagk.

  She kept on struggling, but it was an unequal match. He held her off until he grew bored with watching her flail about. Then he pulled her to him and covered her mouth with his. His lips were slippery and his breath smelled disgusting, but she couldn't shake him. When he finished kissing her, he threw her roughly over the front of his horse and began to ride away with her. As they passed through the crowd of women, the older ones laughed and the younger ones began to sing. She felt completely h
umiliated and helpless, but she was too proud to cry in front of them so she began to curse instead. The man didn't know what she was saying, but he could guess. All at once he reined in his horse, grabbed her hair, jerked her head back, and slapped her so hard she saw stars.

  As she reeled back, sick and dizzy from the blow, she heard a familiar voice. Somehow she managed to turn her head. There, not more than fifteen paces away, was Stavan! He was much thinner than he'd been when she last saw him, and he was dressed in rags with straw in his hair and no boots on his feet, but it was Stavan for sure.

  "Help me!" she cried. Did he hear her? She never knew. Two warriors were pursuing him, and as she yelled for help they leapt on him and started to wrestle him to the ground.

  Stavan gave a cry of rage. He balled up his fist and hit one of the men, knocking him down, but two more ran up and grabbed his arms. The five men scrambled in the dust, with Stavan getting the worst of it.

  Vlahan looked at the struggle thoughtfully for a moment before he gave Marrah another blow that knocked her flat against the side of the horse. "Numish," he said, and the women all laughed.

  Later she learned that numish was the Hansi word for "bewitched."

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Stavan had once told Marrah that Hansi brides passed their wedding nights in a special white tent decorated with clan signs, but all Vlahan did was ride back to his own tent, drag her inside, and order his wife and concubine to clear out. The concubine was a small, frightened-looking girl who couldn't have been older than twelve: a Tcvali chief's daughter with pale skin, pale gray eyes, and hair the color of wet straw. The wife was the square-faced, redheaded woman who had sat on Marrah, and when she saw her struggling in Vlahan's arms she gave her a look of pure hatred. Her name was Timak, and the concubine's name was Hiknak. Later, Marrah came to know both of them well, especially redheaded Timak, who did everything she could to make her life unbearable, but on that first night she was too terrified to see how much Timak hated her. As Vlahan pulled her into the tent, she begged both women to help her, but at a single word from him they ran like rabbits and left her to face him alone.

  After they were gone, Vlahan threw her on a pile of rugs and stood over her, laughing and kicking her down every time she tried to sit up. When he tired of that game, he stripped off his leggings and, without even removing his boots, fell on her, tore her thighs apart, and thrust himself in her. She was so dry and unwilling that his penis burned like a hot stick. Screaming and beating on his back, she tried to throw him off, but he weighed twice as much as she did and his arms were like ropes. He seemed to find her cries of pain quite natural, even exciting. He ignored her and shoved himself in and out of her with a strange, distant expression on his face. As soon as he came, he rolled off, grabbed her by the chin, pried her mouth open, shoved his penis in it, and forced her to bring him to climax a second time. By then she knew that if she bit him he'd break her neck, so she did what he wanted, gagging at the smell of him.

  The same horror was repeated several times. When he was finally satisfied, Vlahan fell asleep, and she lay beside him sobbing and humiliated. She hated him so much that if she could have reached his dagger she would have stuck it into his heart, but he had put it well out of reach, and every time she so much as moved, he woke and made more demands on her.

  She spent a sleepless night, half smothered by the heat and smell of the enemy who lay next to her. For the first time in her life she felt shamed by sex, and she cried — very quietly — for Stavan, who might be dead, and for love, which would never be quite the same again.

  The final humiliation came the next morning when Vlahan jerked her to her feet and indicated by gestures that she was to go get him a drink of water. Sore and sick with lack of sleep, she staggered to the other side of the tent, picked up a collapsible leather bucket, and limped toward the open flap, hoping that at last she might be able to escape. Instead, she found a whole group of old women waiting outside.

  As soon as they saw her, the women pounced on her, laughing and making obscene gestures. Zulike, Zuhan's wife, was among them, and when she had finished pinching Marrah's cheeks and parading her around for the others to inspect, she went into Vlahan's tent and came out with one of the rugs Vlahan and Marrah had slept on the night before. There was a spot of blood on the rug no bigger than a half a palm, but the women seemed delighted by this proof of Vlahan's brutality. Holding the rug so the blood was clearly visible, they went from tent to tent, displaying it proudly. They sang and laughed and drove Marrah before them so she could be seen by everyone in the camp.

  Marrah was too proud to cry in public. She walked behind her own blood with a face of stone, not looking to the left or right as Vlahan's rape of her was proclaimed as a happy event. Later she learned that displaying the bloody rug was an ancient Hansi custom. If a bride didn't bleed, she could be sent back to her father, demoted to a slave, or even murdered by her own husband. Instead of taking revenge, the dead woman's family was obliged to give the bride price back, and the bride's mother was so shamed she sometimes committed suicide.

  After Marrah was paraded around the camp, she was taken back to Vlahan's tent. Vlahan's wife, Timak, met her on the threshold with her brawny arms folded across her chest and a grim, cold look in her eyes. Motioning for Marrah to come closer, she suddenly lifted her foot and kicked her hard in the stomach. Then she fell on her, slapping her, scratching her, and biting her. As the two women rolled in the dust, the others cheered them on, but once again, it was an unequal match. Marrah was younger, but Timak was taller and strong as a horse. Soon she had Marrah down and was beating her head on the ground. When Marrah, knocked half senseless, gave up fighting, Timak climbed off her with a grunt of satisfaction, went into the tent, came out with a basket, and threw it at her. Picking up a handful of fresh horse dung, she spread it on Marrah's white tunic and indicated by gestures that she was to go gather a basket full of the stuff and spread it out to dry beside the tent so it could be used for the cooking fire.

  Happy to do anything to get away, Marrah picked up the basket and went off in search of dung, but she was not allowed any privacy. Wherever she went, someone always followed her, ready to raise the alarm if she so much as lifted her eyes toward the freedom of the steppes. She worked until she was numb with exhaustion, and each time she brought back a full basket of dung, Timak greeted her with a grim smile, a harsh word, and a slap. Later she learned that it was traditional for the first wife to abuse any new woman her husband brought into the tent and that by Hansi standards Timak was being almost pleasant.

  Time passed. As Marrah busied herself laying out the dung to dry as Timak had ordered, she worried about Arang. She hadn't seen him since yesterday, and as the sun dipped lower and lower toward the great, flat horizon, she began to be afraid that Changar had slit his neck the way he had slit the necks of the horses. It was a horrible image and she did her best to put it out of her mind, but she had suffered too much violence to think peaceful thoughts.

  "Sweet Goddess," she prayed, "let Arang come back safe." But it grew later and Arang didn't come, and her anxiety increased until not even Timak's threats and loudly barked commands could keep her from stopping to listen every time she heard the sound of an approaching horse.

  Finally, just before sunset, Arang appeared, walking slowly between the long shadows cast by the tents. He was dressed in Hansi leggings and a short belted tunic, all very finely embroidered with suns and stars, but at the sight of his face, Marrah screamed and ran to take him in her arms.

  "Don't hug me while the nomads are watching," he begged, pushing her away with trembling hands. He sat down beside the dung basket and looked at her as if he were about to cry. Both his cheeks were covered with bloody scars and the rest of his hair had been cut off. He looked wounded, bewildered, and very young.

  They sat silently for a while. Finally she spoke. "What did they do to your face?" She reached out to caress him and stopped herself just in time. He was right. Nomads ne
ver showed any tenderness to each other in public. For all she knew, one hug could get them both beaten senseless.

  Arang touched his left cheek, winced, and looked around apprehensively. "They put Achan's clan marks on me." His voice trembled. "Changar pounded the tattoos into me with the point of a dagger and I think he promised I'd get more when I came of age, but I'm not sure. Dalish wasn't there to translate."

  "Oh, Arang, that's terrible!"

  "It was. But I didn't cry. I couldn't." He lowered his voice to a whisper. "If I'd cried, I think they would have killed me." He drew himself up into a ball, arms around knees, like a little turtle pulling into its shell.

  She felt so sorry for him she forgot her own troubles for a moment. "You poor thing. It must have hurt a lot. Just look at you — cuts all over and none of them clean. I think they used charcoal!" She reached for her medicine bag. "We have to get a barberry leaf poultice on those sores right away before they fester."

  He shook his head.

  "What do you mean no? Don't be silly. Do you want your face to drop off?"

  "It's not just my face."

  "What do you mean?"

  "They did something else to me."

  "What?"

  To her surprise he wouldn't tell her.

  "Please, talk to me. I'm your big sister. I love you. Whatever they did wasn't your fault."

  He ducked his head, looked away, was ashamed. Little by little, she brought him around and he haltingly explained that Changar had given him some kind of drink that made him lose all feeling in his body, and when he was too numb and dizzy to fight them off the men had pulled down his leggings and cut off part of his penis.