by Judith Tarr
He nodded.
“Wonderful,” she said, brushing his brow with her hand, feeling the soft flutter of eyelids under her palm. “So few can see. Even some who call themselves shamans—they’re blind to the light.”
“It’s so clear,” he said. “How can they not see it?”
“They don’t have the eyes. But you,” she said, “do.” And such beautiful clear grey eyes, in so very handsome a face. She could never get enough of it. Many nights, long after he had fallen asleep, she would lie awake by whatever light there was—moonlight, firelight, starlight—and simply gaze at him. He was so very familiar, and yet he was all new, all wonderful, as if he had been a stranger.
oOo
By the deep heart of winter, she knew what their loving had made. It was very early; she had barely missed her courses. And yet she was a shaman. She felt it inside her, the tiny spark, growing as the days lengthened.
She did not tell him as soon as she knew. It was so early, and he was a man of the People; he might be odd about it, or be terribly silly and solicitous as some of the young men of the Grey Horse were inclined to be.
Here, the office of father mattered less than the office of clan-brother—as Cloud was to Rain. But they did know how babies began, and mostly the women took care to note which of their lovers was likely to have fathered the child. It was a gift, from man to woman and from woman to man. And if he was of such a mind, the man might be rather a fool about it.
“As if,” Rain said once, “he had devoted more than a few moments’ effort to it.” But she said it as gently as she said anything, with a shrug and a smile at Cloud.
Cloud for once was taking notice of her rather than Keen, and he returned the smile, unabashed. He was quietly proud of the baby growing in her belly.
It was not his first, Sparrow discovered, though Rain had not had a child before. Half a dozen of the dark-eyed children running about the camp had his pleasant blunt features and his beautiful long-lashed eyes. Their mothers made no claim on him that Sparrow could see, nor thrust the children at him, but they appeared to know who was their father.
It was a strange, rather subtle way of doing things, but people seemed content with it. Since mother-clan was the only one that mattered, mothers’ brothers helped raise the children, or if there were no brothers, elder sons or, rarely, fathers performed the duty. All of Cloud’s children had uncles to teach them the ways of the tribe.
That maybe was why he was so intent on Rain’s child. He was its father, but also its clan-uncle. He would raise it and seal it with its name, once its mother had told him what that was.
Sparrow, cherishing the secret within her, reflected that Kestrel was as close to a true heart’s brother as she had ever had. Like Cloud, he could be both brother and lover. And he would help her raise this child. He was wonderful with children, patient and forbearing with the handful who followed him about; he was teaching them to hunt, and make and fletch arrows, and knap flint for arrowheads and spearheads and knifeblades. What joy he would take, she thought, in teaching his own child to do all of that; to make a hunter of it as his father had made of him.
oOo
Spring came all at once and almost unexpected. One day they were gripped in the icy heart of winter, suffering a blizzard so fierce that it plucked several tents from their moorings and froze one of the oxen where he stood among his fellows. The next morning rose clear and bright and unwontedly warm. The snow began to melt, the ice to slip from the branches of the trees. They were able to butcher the ox and share a feast, a rite of newborn spring.
That night Rain went into the birthing-house, which in this tribe was in the camp’s center—not set apart and hidden from the eyes and ears of men, but full in their midst, so that everyone knew and shared in the birthing. By morning she had delivered a daughter, a fine strong creature who had, her mother swore, her father’s eyes.
Sparrow could not tell. Babies were babies, red squalling things of no beauty or charm. But its mother was vastly proud of it, and its father doted on it. It was, she conceded, a good omen, that winter’s end should bring so strong a life into the world.
The child was named Spring, aptly enough. Her mother recovered quickly from the birth, suffered neither fever nor weakness, but was blessed of the gods and of Earth Mother.
That too was an omen. It heartened the people, and brightened the rising spring.
oOo
When the snows had melted and the snow-waters roared past, and the rivers quieted somewhat, Kestrel left the Grey Horse People. He rode out hunting, or so everyone thought. But he did not come back.
Sparrow had known. In her heart, she had felt it. His joy in her was as great as ever, his loving both passionate and tender. But after he had gone, she saw what she had been refusing to see.
He had agreed that he had no hope of taking the stallion back to the People. He had never quite promised that he would stay. His duty bound him, and his given word. Once winter’s long waiting was over, he had to go. He had no choice.
He said no farewells. He went hunting, that was all. The trail he took led to the great river in the north, and over it, and on to the plains and the People.
oOo
Sparrow raged. She tried to raise magics, storms, floodwaters. But the gods were not listening. Earth Mother would not obey her. Whether this was ordained, or the gods simply did not care, Kestrel went unhindered; and she could not follow. The mare would not go. The stallion, who might have been willing, was in the mare’s power. She kept him by her, nor suffered Sparrow to approach him.
Sparrow was bound to this camp and this tribe. Here Horse Goddess had sent her. Here she must stay.
No one could offer her comfort. None but Rain, who was neither her friend nor her ally, but they were, in a fashion, sisters. “He’ll come back,” Rain said.
“Yes,” said Sparrow bitterly. “At the head of an army. Or as a head on a spear.”
“Then at least you’ll see him again,” Rain said: rough comfort indeed, but in its way it lessened her grief. Not her anger, never that, but it braced her spirit.
PART THREE:
HORSE GODDESS’ CHILDREN
41
When the king of the White Stone stallions was taken away, the gathering of tribes rose up in revolt. A king stripped of his stallion, cried his brother kings, was no king at all. And if the White Stone People had lost their king of stallions, they had lost their kingship. They were no longer chief among the tribes.
Cliff Lion was swift to claim that eminence. Red Deer and Dun Cow raised rival claims. Well before evening of the day after the stallion was stolen, the gathering had broken into a dozen squabbling factions.
Linden had come back to the camp, riding behind Curlew on that young man’s sturdy bay, and halted in front of his tent, and shut himself in it. His companions would not let even Walker pass. He had to invoke the power of his office. Even then they made him surrender such weapons as he allowed unsanctified eyes to see.
He took the insult to heart, and would remember it. But for now he had greater matters to attend to.
Linden was deep inside the tent, pacing and snarling like a lion in a cave. Every now and then he seized on something within reach, tore it or kicked it or flung it.
Walker watched him with interest. For so equable a man, he had a rather imposing temper. But there was a distinct air of petulance in it. He did not have the gift of the grand passion, the towering wrath that made a man terrible.
Walker, whose own anger was winter-cold, considered the uses and misuses of this man whom he had made king. He had put aside for the moment the other thing, the thing that ate at his spirit: the discovery that his sister, the messenger of his visions, had taken his wife and his king of stallions and ridden away. Curlew, who was far-sighted, had seen who it was—
impossible, preposterous, but there could be no denying it.
That would be dealt with in its due time. For the moment it mattered more that he rein in this pretty id
iot of a king, and teach him to say the words that would quell the tribes.
“Lord king,” Walker said in his sweetest voice.
Linden wheeled. “You! Get out.”
“My lord,” said Walker, “the tribes need their king.”
“Pestilence take the tribes! Those—those women stole my horse!”
Walker suppressed a sigh. “My lord—”
Linden was not listening. “I’ve sent men after them. I’ll send more. I’ll raise an army. Any man who brings them back to me alive, and my stallion safe, I’ll reward him—what shall I give him, shaman? Will women do? Cattle? Horses?”
“My lord,” said Walker, raising his voice slightly in hope of catching the king’s attention, “that is well thought of, and shall be done. But while your hunters pursue the thieves, you and only you must settle the tribes. I would suggest that—”
“You do that,” Linden said. “Tell them the stallion will be back in a day or two. Then I’ll show them how a king punishes such profanation.”
“It’s not that simple, my lord,” Walker said. “The people—”
“Tell them,” Linden said. “Leave me alone. Tell everyone to leave me alone. Except a woman. I will have a woman. Tell one of the servants. They’ll fetch one for me.”
Walker would dearly have loved to wring that pretty neck. But he needed this man still—not for terribly long, perhaps, but long enough. “I’ll send you a woman, my lord,” he said. “Be at ease. Rest as you can. Try to calm your spirit.”
“Yes, yes,” Linden said testily. “Go away. You’re not bad to look at, mind, but I’d rather be looking at a woman.”
oOo
Walker sent him a woman. He sent his father’s wife White Bird, who was quite as pretty and fully as stupid as Linden.
She did not care that another man than her husband had called her out of the tent and given her orders—for they were orders that she was glad to take. “The king!” she cried, clapping her hands. “Oh, yes. I’ll go now. I’ll make him forget all his grief. He’ll love me, yes he will.”
Walker was sure that he would. He stared down the crone who had wandered in while he instructed White Bird. The crone met his stare brazenly, but she was only an old woman. He forgot her as soon as he had gone on the next of his errands.
oOo
The kings and shamans and some of the elders of the tribes had gathered in the sacred place around the stone of sacrifice. Their factions were obvious, small scowling knots of men, each separate from the other, with much shouting back and forth. Cliff Lion’s king, who was called the Bull, had leaped up on the stone of sacrifice and begun to harangue the crowd.
He was, in his way, little more intelligent and hardly less foolish than Linden. Walker looked about for a man of greater sense. Red Deer and Dun Cow were ruled by warleaders, men for whom battle was meat and drink. Black Bull’s king was old, with a pack of quarrelling sons. Tall Grass—Walker nodded to himself. Yes, there was an alliance he could use, and the king was comfortably in the shaman’s power.
As he moved toward the western edge of the field, where Tall Grass stood with a gathering of lesser allies, a ripple ran through the crowd.
Someone new was coming. A man on a grey horse, one of the royal mares no less, and no shame that he, a man grown, an elder and a shaman, should stoop to ride so lowly a creature. He rode slowly down the track that priests took in procession. Silence followed in his wake.
Walker watched him in shock. Drinks-the-Wind should have been lying in the innermost space of his tent, lost to dreams and slow poison. He was pale, he was thin to emaciation, but his grey eyes burned in his white face. He was not only alive, he was stronger than he had any right to be.
The mare carried him to the stone of sacrifice. The Bull, whose speech had trailed off as the shaman drew closer, lowered his head and hunched his heavy shoulders and retreated from the stone.
The mare climbed up on it. She was a massive thing, and not young, with a heavy broodmare’s belly, but she was agile and strong. The stone was just large enough to hold her and the man astride her back.
Drinks-the-Wind looked out over the gathered kings and elders and shamans. His eyes were full of light. Walker had not yet learned the trick of that. Maybe it needed the full pallor of white hair, white beard, and colorless skin, and the sun striking the eyes just so.
The shaman spoke. His voice was not particularly loud. It was clear, and carried well enough, if those on the edges moved in closer. Which they did, drawn as if by a spell, but it was only the power of curiosity.
“My lords, my brothers, my kin. This is a terrible thing that has befallen us, and it dishonors us all. But if a spirit of ill-will wrought this thing, then it rejoices now to hear you. The breaking of the tribes would be its dearest hope, and war would give it great satisfaction.”
“Surely!” shouted a man from among those of the Dun Cow. “It was your daughter who stole the kingship. What do you have to say to that, old man?”
Drinks-the-Wind did not seem dismayed. “I say, sir, that when she is found—and I pray that be quick—I will be foremost among those who call for her judgment. My fault that in naming her I gave her life. I will redeem that fault once she stands before us.”
Men nodded at that, and muttered approval. But the man of the Dun Cow was not satisfied. “I hear tell she’s a witch’s child. What if she’s in league with the dark gods? Can you protect us against them?”
“If that is so,” said Drinks-the-Wind, “then all of us priests and shamans will protect you and your people. That I swear to you, as elder shaman of the White Stone People.”
Maybe he had not won them all over, but he had won enough. When he dismissed them, and bade them wait, be patient, pray to their gods for guidance, they obeyed him. He had great presence, and great skill in wielding it: white man in white garment, mounted on white mare, standing on the stone of sacrifice.
oOo
Walker could admire the beauty of it, even as he brooded over the failure of his potions. He had had in mind to do something rather similar, but in the end it mattered little that his father had done it. It quieted the tribes, for a while; that was what mattered.
He could see that he would have to dispose of the old man rather more directly, and rather soon. He could not have Drinks-the-Wind claiming back his old place beside the king. That belonged to Walker now, and Walker meant to keep it.
In the meantime Walker set about making use of the lull between the first shock of anger and the eruption that would follow. He sent word to the shaman of the Tall Grass that the wedding would proceed, and quickly. He sent word also to each of the kings, in his own king’s name, proposing a great alliance, a royal wedding, with each king invited to send a daughter to the king of the White Stone People.
And while that was in train, he approached Linden again.
Linden was lying in White Bird’s arms. Her wonderful white breasts were bare, and he was suckling at them. Her face wore an expression of creamy pleasure, which altered not at all when she saw that Walker was watching. Indeed she smiled, heavy-lidded, and tilted her head just so: inviting him to partake, too, if he was so minded.
His lips twisted in disgust. He had perforce to wait until Linden, too, had noticed him—a time during which he was well apprised of his king’s tastes in womanflesh. Maybe, he thought, he should send new messages to the kings and bid them send daughters who had borne gods’ children, rather than daughters who were at least publicly acknowledged to be maidens.
Linden emerged from his preoccupation at last, unperturbed to find that he had an audience. Like White Bird, he seemed minded to offer Walker a portion; but Walker forestalled him. “My lord,” he said, “if you please, I’ve servants waiting to bathe and dress you.”
“A bath would be pleasant,” Linden said lazily. “But clothes? Why? I’m not leaving here.”
“My lord, you are,” said Walker. “Tonight you dance in front of the kings of the tribes. Tomorrow you take to wife
a daughter of each. And tomorrow night,” he said, smiling though his gorge rose, “you may rut like a bull in a herd of eager heifers.”
Linden’s eyes gleamed at that, but White Bird cried out in dismay—a sound less like birdsong than a hawk’s scream. “You can’t do that! He’s mine!”
“Why, surely,” said Linden. “And you are mine. But just think— all those pretty faces. All that soft skin. Won’t you be glad to share it with me?”
“May I?” she asked, breathless.
He nodded.
She clapped her hands. “Oh! Yes, that would be so delightful. But,” she said, sobering suddenly, “you must promise me. You are mine. The others can belong to you, but you cannot belong to them.”
“You had me first,” Linden said—which was by no means a promise, but she seemed content with it.
oOo
If he learned to seduce men as he seduced women, he would be a striking figure of a king. Walker pondered the advantages of that as he completed the last of his errands.
Drinks-the-Wind had left the stone of sacrifice and, it seemed, sent the mare back to her herd. He was not in his tent or in the shamans’ tent. Walker had nearly lost patience with the hunt when he found his father outside the camp, sitting by the old king’s barrow. He looked like a ghost or wandering spirit, a white and motionless figure, with the wind plucking at his robe and running fingers through his beautiful long beard.
He was aware of Walker’s coming, though he did not acknowledge it until Walker stood over him. Then he lifted those clear pale eyes and said, “If you’re wise, you’ll let me live a while.”
Walker widened his own eyes, which he knew were neither as clear nor as pale as his father’s; but his face, he thought, was more distinctly beautiful. “Let you live, Father? Surely it’s the gods who do the letting.”
“Don’t play me for a fool,” Drinks-the-Wind said. “Not that I haven’t been one; I should have known long ago what was being slipped into my cup. The girl who did it is dead. Next time, if you must corrupt one of my daughters, find one with a little more courage. That one broke and wept before I laid a hand on her. It was a dreadful and noisy chore to force the whole of the vial down her throat. She took a long time to die, and not pleasantly, either.”
