The Wild Road

by Jennifer Roberson

  Rhuan looked up and met the ale-keep’s eye. He had never asked, because the ale-tent and its owner were familiar, comfortable, affable. Mikal kept to the habits expected of a man who ran an ale-tent. He served others, and was not served himself. He was remakable in no way, if memorable because of the eye-patch. A big, wide, dark-haired man, no longer young but neither old. His weathered face bore the shadow of a beard.

  Curiosity overcame tact; though Mikal had in no way ever suggested tact was necessary. Rhuan simply asked. “What did you do before coming here?”

  “Lived in Cardatha.”

  Rhuan indicated the map. “That is beautiful work.”

  “No,” Mikal said, “that is competent work. Apprentice work.” He smiled crookedly, looking down at the sheet of parchment.

  The realization came swiftly. “You were in the Mapmakers Guild.”

  “I was.”

  Rhuan shook his head. “Why did you leave the Guild? Why did you leave Cardatha to come here, pouring ale and spirits for travelers?” He paused, realizing with a brief inward wince that in saying so, he insulted the work Mikal did now. “I mean, those accepted to guilds are known as gifted folk. As you are gifted.” He indicated the inked map. “It’s obvious.”

  “I lost an eye,” Mikal said. “I was dismissed from the Guild. A one-eyed man lacks perspective in what he sees, in what he draws.” His shrug was nearly imperceptible. “So I took up a new trade.”

  “And left behind an art.” Rhuan shook his head; again, tact fell victim to disbelief. “They were fools.”

  “One might argue that,” Mikal agreed, “but the Guild is most stringent. A permanent injury to eyes or fingers is cause for dismissal. All of us know that when we apply.” He smoothed a finger across his eye-patch. “The irony of all ironies is that this injury was caused by an ink pen. It was a minor thing, an argument between two journeymen about something inconsequential. But it grew to something more physical. And this was the result.” Again he shrugged. “An accident. Not intentional.”

  “But it ended the life you knew.” No bitterness lived in Mikal’s tone, merely honesty. “Yes.”

  “What became of the other journeyman?”

  “He eventually advanced to master.”

  Rhuan was taken aback. “He wasn’t dismissed? He blinded you in one eye, caused your dismissal, and was kept on?”

  Mikal nodded. “But he had a true gift. An eye, you might say.” The tone was wry. “You don’t dismiss a man who may one day redefine an art.” He smiled, the remaining eye distant with memories. “I took a job in a tavern, there in Cardatha. I put aside coin-rings. And eventually I took to the road, looking for a good place to set up my own tent.” A gesture indicated the surroundings. “And here I am.”

  Rhuan was intuitive enough to realize that if he said more about the loss, about the permanent alteration of Mikal’s life from gifted mapmaker to ale-keep, he would diminish the man as he was now. And that, he could not countenance. “Then we will make good use of your gift, and thank you for it.” He reached to pick up the board with Brodhi’s rough map tacked to it. “As I set up cairns, I’ll mark them on this. Each night I’ll return it to you.”

  “Rhuan.” Mikal’s hand pressed the board down. “What did you do before coming here?”

  His own words, asked in very much the same tone of casual curiosity. And yet he knew that was not its intent at all. Mikal suspected something. I told Ilona. The farmsteader. And Jorda. And Bethid knew because of Ilona. At this rate, everyone in the settlement will know!

  Rhuan stared at Mikal, saying nothing; silence sometimes served better than replies. Prior to Alisanos going active, he had been thought a dangerous man. If necessary, he could call up a hint of that attitude to control the conversation. He could borrow something of his sire’s arrogance. He had done it before.

  But the ale-keep smiled. “What did you do before coming here?”

  He could not reply, as Mikal, that he had lived in Cardatha. He shrugged off-handedly. “I’ve no place truly to call, or make, my own. The karavan is my home. The road.”

  The expression in Mikal’s narrowed eye suggested he didn’t believe that. But the ale-keep let it go. He gave Rhuan the board. “The hands have not forgotten. I thought perhaps they had, when Brodhi gave me his map to copy. But no. Perhaps one never forgets what once meant the most.” He reached for some fabric folded on the bartop. “It’s waxed,” he said. “Keep it draped over the map when you’re not working on it. We dare not let the rain ruin it.”

  Rhuan accepted the fabric. “That said, I think I’ll go by Jorda’s wagon to collect my rain gear. It might not rain again until tomorrow, but the beginning of monsoon is always unpredictable.” He tucked the board beneath one arm and headed toward the door flap.

  As he reached it, Mikal said, “It’s wasn’t a difficult question, Rhuan, what I asked.”

  Rhuan halted at the exit. All manner of explanations ran through his head as he stood there, deciding how to respond. He used none of them, however; resorted instead to truth. “No, it wasn’t. But it’s a difficult answer.”

  AS BETHID DUCKED back into the common tent, she saw precisely what she expected to see: Timmon and Alorn seated on bedding, staring expectantly at her. They had heard just enough of Rhuan’s and Brodhi’s heated discussion to incite intense curiosity. She sighed and knelt down on her own bedding, digging out the two heavy oiled canvas bags she used for her belongings on the road. It was a drawstring affair, leather thongs fed through stitched holes and tied off. An interior flap was tucked over the last item, and then each bag was snugged closed and attached to either side of the saddle.

  “Well?” Alorn asked.

  Bethid used the explanation that had satisfied her curiosity before she knew the truth. “It’s a Shoia thing, I gather.” She said it casually, hitching one shoulder up in a dismissive shrug. “Did I not know they were cousins, I’d say they were brothers, bickering so.” She began to gather together clothing and other items, folding and rolling, then tucked them safely into the two drawstring bags. “All I can say is, they’re very different from—” she caught herself before she said humans, “—the rest of us. But it’s their business, regardless.” She glanced at them both. “I suspect we’ll be heading out tomorrow. Remember, Jorda said he wants to get to Cardatha as soon as possible, before the monsoon makes the roads completely impassable. You might want to start packing up. I’m taking everything . . . the Mother knows when we might come this way again.”

  For all she was speaking to turn their thoughts elsewhere, she also spoke the truth. It was up to the Guildmaster to give them new orders, handing them scroll cases containing fresh correspondence. Thanks to Alisanos, they had remained at the settlement much longer than was ordinarily the case. “He’s a karavan-master; he’ll want to leave at first light.”

  Timmon laughed briefly. “I’ll be glad to see the inside of a brick-built tavern! The ale-tent here is better than nothing, but I do prefer the variety—”

  “—of women,” Bethid said wryly, finishing it for him.

  “—of spirits,” Timmon declared.

  Bethid continued to pack. “That, too, I suppose.”

  Alorn snickered. “Preferably, both at the same time.”

  “Women and ale, women and spirits . . .” Timmon sighed blissfully. “An excellent pairing. After too long a time.”

  Bethid laughed briefly on a gust of breath. “For that, there are the Sisters. Right here in the settlement.”

  Timmon’s eyes widened. “Sweet Mother, I forgot about the Sisters!” He shot Alorn a glance. “We do have tonight.”

  “First light means first light,” Bethid reminded them. “Jorda is not about to forgive tardiness because you spent the night with a woman. He’ll leave you behind.”

  Alorn scoffed. “It’s not as if we couldn’t find our
own way to Cardatha.”

  “Maybe, once you made it beyond Alisanos. If you could,” Bethid said. “But Brodhi will guide us through the passageway to the safety of the open plains. You’ll forgo that if you depart later, on your own.”

  The mention of the deepwood silenced them. Both now wore glum faces.

  Bethid shook her head, grinning crookedly. “There is plenty of time to visit the Sisters before we leave. Just be back before dawn.”

  A note of careful curiosity shaded Alorn’s tone. “Bethid . . . what do you do?”

  She glanced up, her mind on packing. “What do I do? What do you mean, what do I do?”

  Color washed through Alorn’s face. “For women.”

  She had never hidden her preferences from fellow couriers. But the question had never been asked so baldly. It surprised her.

  “I mean . . .” Alorn’s face was still red. “We can go to a tavern in Cardatha and find women. Or, as you said, to the Sisters of the Road. But what about you?”

  Bethid smiled, savoring the moment. Both men were rapt, waiting for her answer. “I can go to a tavern in Cardatha and find women.”

  Timmon blinked. “But—”

  She was matter-of-fact. “Women who spread their legs for men don’t look for joy from it. Some of them—some, not all—look for that with another woman.” A bubble of laughter rose in her chest. She struck a thoughtful pose. “Perhaps I should go to the Sisters tonight.”

  The observation had the effect she wanted. Timmon and Alorn recoiled in surprise, then glanced at one another. In accord they rose and went out the open door flap in some haste.

  Bethid grinned, raising her voice. “Tell the ladies I might be by this evening!”

  Chapter 15

  THE SINGLE SUN of the human world struck Alario as indicative of humans themselves. They did not live as brightly. Their spirits were dim. The same could be said of their sun. Singular. Tepid. Impotent. He did not have to drop the membrane over his eyes.

  Alario stood in the shelter of tall poisonous shrubs, of twisted trees, thorny vines, sharp-edged ferns, as the weak human sun surrendered slowly to twilight. All primaries learned that stillness was often necessary in Alisanos, to hide oneself from threat. As now it was necessary, though for a markedly different reason.

  He stood in silence on the verge of the deepwood, invisible to human eyes, if not those of other primaries, and watched his get mark out the borders.

  Rhuan gathered no rocks just yet, but used limbs broken from trees as temporary markers. After testing where the border of Alisanos began and ended, he pressed the limbs down into the ground, leaving a vertical guide where cairns would be built. Once that was done, he marked each placement on the rough map, flipping fabric over the board when he wasn’t drawing. It was a slow, meticulous process; clearly Rhuan wanted to be most careful in protecting humans from the depredations of Alisanos. Wasted time, Alario reflected. What did it matter that some humans were lost to the deepwood? They bred frequently enough that there were always replacements. He did not understand why they mourned. His people did not mourn a death. His people knew full well that any primary lost was not worth saving. He certainly felt nothing of what the humans called grief when the woman he impregnated died whelping the child whom he’d named Rhuan—back when Alario believed in the infant’s future.

  A muscle leaped in Alario’s cheek. All but four get had died in the normal progression from adolescence into maturity. Two had managed to kill one another, while a third failed but survived, leaving Alario with no get at all save Rhuan. He could not accept that this might be his failure, this dioscuri who wanted nothing to do with the customs of the primaries, the advantages and power. Surely the human dam was responsible.

  I should have exposed him at birth. Except that, at birth, no one could have predicted that the dam’s blood would so heavily pollute the child. That only became known when Rhuan was old enough to challenge his brother-get and did not. When confronted by his sire, Rhuan said, quietly but firmly, that death was the central defining belief of his people and he wanted nothing to do with it. No challenges among siblings, and none intended for his sire, either.

  Alario knew very well he would defeat his weak get in a challenge. With dioscuri who would not participate in the traditional challenges, it was less trouble, perhaps, to cull early. Adolescent get learned how to fight by fighting one another. It prepared them for the challenge of adulthood, when bodies and spirits were united in the insatiable drive to kill, to survive, to become a primary. To kill their sires. If they lost but survived the battles of get against get, then they were pronounced unworthy. And castrated, because they should not be allowed to breed. Gelded to remind them forever that from the highest of potentials, they had fallen to the lowest.

  One of his get had been castrated.

  But neuters were certainly useful. Alario admitted that. They planted and harvested, wove blankets and rugs, chiseled attractive shapes into rock walls, created the painstaking beauty of carefully assembled stone and pebbles into walkways. So many things, the neuters did. So that the primaries need not dirty their hands.

  Amused, Alario glanced down at his upturned hand. No indeed, there had never been any doubt that he would triumph when he challenged his sire. At the age humans called fourteen, after he had challenged and defeated several brother-get and then his sire, he ascended; the youngest ever to become a primary in the history of his people. And he managed it before going on his journey in the human world.

  One might assume a primary such as he would sire superior dioscuri. But his sole surviving get was utterly worthless, a stain upon Alario’s reputation, his position among his people. “A weak seed,” he knew, was the term among the other primaries. He could hear it in his head: Alario’s seed is weak. He gives us a neuter, and he gives us a dioscuri not worthy of the title.

  Alario respected tradition. It was what bound them all. He would thus not kill his worthless get before the time came for challenge. It was rather a delicious image, the failure of Rhuan. The death of Rhuan.

  Whereas Brodhi, if he were successful in his challenge, ascended.

  If Brodhi did so, it removed Karadath from the pantheon. That, Alario would relish; he and his brother-get had fought multiple times throughout the years, but despite injury, neither had been able to kill his kin-in-kind. Both were simply too strong. And now that Brodhi and Rhuan were on their journey, neither Karadath nor Alario could challenge one another.

  Waiting those five human years was a challenge in and of itself.

  Karadath had mated with a human dam, and got Brodhi. He, Alario, had mated with a human dam and got Rhuan.

  But. But. Perhaps he could sire his own version of Brodhi on another human dam.

  That is what brought him to the border between Alisanos and the human world.

  Alario looked again at his get, efficiently marking the map. The sun now was nearly gone, dusk turning to dark. He raised hands to his head and began to undo the intricate braiding, stripping away beads and charms and golden rings.

  AS THE SUN slid below the horizon, Davyn considered returning to his wagon. The rain had stopped, it was time for dinner, and he was hungry, but the idea of returning to a wagon empty of his wife, of his children, depressed him. He remained at the table in Mikal’s ale-tent. With the arrival of evening, Mikal had put lighted candlecups on each table, sending drifts of smoke toward the Mother Rib of the big tent as well as casting a brassy, burnished glow. Men began to drift in, asking for ale.

  Hunched at the table, Davyn leaned forward on his elbows and threaded fingers through his hair, cradling his forehead against the heels of his hands. His spirit wanted to cry out, to release the tension and grief. His eyes stung and throat tightened. But he withstood the urge to weep. He was a private man; there was no reason for him to display his emotions to others. Yet they hurt. They sat in
his gut like burning coals, eating through tender viscera to muscle and flesh. The question he had purposely ignored rose to the surface, expressed itself against his wishes.

  What will I do if I never see them again?

  And worse, if what Rhuan said was true, What will I do if they are no longer what they were? No longer—human?

  He flinched.

  In his mind’s eye he saw Audrun laughing, tawny hair loose around her shoulders. Gillan, eldest son, caught between childhood and adulthood. Ellica, lovely as her mother in her own way, though fairer of hair and complexion; that was his own contribution. All of the children were fairer than their mother. Torvic, missing two teeth in front and his shock of pale hair standing up from his skull, had a mischevous temperament that endeared him to everyone. And Megritte, his baby . . . just beginning to establish her personality as apart from her older siblings. Pretty Meggie with braids almost constantly half undone.

  The guide had told him, They will not be what they once were. But Davyn could not imagine it, could not see either wife or children ever different from when he last saw them. It was impossible to believe a place could so completely alter humans

  Oh, he had heard of Alisanos. But it had been a distant presence. His folk had always lived in the central portion of Sancorra province. And although he, like everyone else, had heard tales of the deepwood’s moving, no such thing had happened in his lifetime. Until now. Alisanos had never seemed real to him. Naught but stories, his father had once said dismissively, and he was not a man who countenanced daydreaming. As the only son, Davyn had grown up working long hours beside his father in the fields. His two sisters and mother harvested the garden, churned milk into butter, made everyone’s clothing from fabric woven on his mother’s loom; tended the goats, cattle, and chickens; and completed any number of other chores. It was hard work, but satisfying. Davyn was proud of what he had accomplished with his father, and when time came for him to marry, he was fully prepared to become master of his own house. And so he had with Audrun.