Southern Fire ac-1

by Juliet E. McKenna

  The trader paused in his open assessment of the youth's neat blue tunic, new cotton trousers and the modest silver chains around his neck and wrists. 'No one knows.' He shrugged, tunic of faded russet riding up on his muscular shoulders, black trousers dusty beneath. The belt that circled his firm waist was none so poor, a fine strap of scarlet leather set with gold Yora hawks' heads, rubies for their eyes. 'That's Jahal ware, traded up from the southeast. They keep their craft secrets closer than a clam's lips in that domain and few enough pieces float along to the likes of us.' He cracked a smile more predatory than friendly. 'Give me something worth my while and you can impress all your friends with it.'

  Plainly tempted, the youth nevertheless set the little ewer down. 'I have nothing to offer that would be worth such a piece.'

  The short man's face turned ugly. 'Then don't waste my time with your crab shit.'

  The youth backed away, affronted, striding straight past the next trader who sat chuckling, shaded from the sun by the nut palms fringing the golden sand of the beach.

  'Dev, it never ceases to amaze me how you make a living when you're so appallingly rude to everyone.'

  'It keeps them keen.' The short man grinned, unrepentant, bending over the neatly trimmed square of hide that displayed his wares. He moved the ewer to a more prominent place among some small copper boxes beaten to a mottled shine. 'See anything you fancy, Bidric?' He paused to rub a finger mark from a silver incense burner shaped like a jungle fowl with the hem of his shabby tunic.

  The other trader shrugged with elaborate unconcern. He was dressed with far more care than Dev, prosperous in green trews and tunic and, despite the heat, wearing a fine sleeveless overmantle of cream cotton decorated with silken vines 'Maybe later. I want to see what I can do with these first.' He spread a plump hand over his neatly folded shawls. Some were little more than gossamer, a whisper of silk painted with sprays of delicate flowers in subtle colours; vizail blossoms, jessamine, fiola. Others offered more practical protection against a chilly night, thicker cotton cheerful with bright patterns drawn in bold needle strokes; logen vines, climbing roses, iris spears.

  'It's a surprise to find you sharing the beach with we lesser traders. A pleasure, of course, but unexpected all the same,' Dev remarked with studied casualness. 'I'd have thought you'd be making your bows to Rivlin Mahaf, drinking chilled lilla juice in the shade of her audience chamber.' He gestured towards a vivid ochre wrap brilliant with little pieces of coloured glass worked into the bold design of a soaring bird. 'That Mirror Bird's just the kind of thing she likes, isn't it? Aren't the ladies of the domain here? Everyone else in these reaches has come for the last trading before the rains.'

  Dev's expansive gesture took in the sizeable numbers walking up and down the beach. The men showed a wide variety of fealty in the differing styles of their daggers just as the women boasted dazzling variations in dressing their hair and tying their wraps.

  'They're here, and we had every expectation of trading with them, same as always.' Bidric smiled invitingly at a woman in a plain white shawl who paused to look at his wares. She waved an apologetic hand before moving on to a herbalist loudly proclaiming the efficacy of his nostrums as he sat on the twisted root of a spinefruit tree, a substantial casket resting on his knees.

  'Is one of the ladies of the domain unwell?' Dev persisted. 'Or the children?'

  'There's no hint of what's going on.' Once the woman's back was to him, Bidric scowled. 'We arrive and find Mahaf Coru's gates shut tighter than a swimming rat's arsehole. I went all the way west to the Galcan domain for that Mirror Bird shawl and better pieces besides, his wives were so keen on the ones I brought them last time. But all the guard captain will say is no traders are welcome at present.'

  'Did you see anyone else getting a welcome while you were kept waiting?' Dev wondered. He looked out to the anchorage thronged with galleys and sailing ships of all sizes. 'I might find someone who'd value that kind of information.'

  'That's for me and mine to know.' Bidric grinned despite himself, his eyes sliding to a middling-sized ship with a striped blue sail. 'And my boys know to keep their mouths shut.'

  'Children are indeed a blessing.' Momentary seriousness flickered over Dev's beardless face.

  'Indeed.' Bidric looked a trifle discomforted, unconsciously running a hand over a black beard smoothed to a dapper point with scented oil. 'Well, Dev, messengers from several of those visiting triremes went straight to Mahaf Coru, going by what the guard captain was shouting. Whatever the news was, it set a good few slaves running in and out like quail caught in a dust storm.'

  'Do you happen to know which triremes warranted a welcome, when others didn't?' Dev grinned broadly. 'That would be worth a choice piece of this Jahal ware.'

  'The gate opened to messengers from Nor, Yava and Kithir and no one else. Then a whole flock of message birds took flight, heading in all directions. I'll take one of those scent burners in exchange for that bit of news.' Bidric narrowed his eyes at Dev. 'There's something else you should know. I heard last night that Yava Aud is as nervy as a hawk on hot sand about something. He hanged three of his warriors for being caught part-drunk at the last full of the Lesser Moon.'

  'A wise warlord keeps his swordsmen alert,' Dev nodded, non-committal.

  Bidric snorted. 'Stick to trading your metal wares, Dev, if you're sitting anywhere near me. I don't want to be swept up along with you if Mahaf Coru decides to clear his anchorage of vice peddlers. You'll—'

  The sudden arrival of shallow boats poled ashore from one of the bigger galleys interrupted him.

  'Looks like you're not the only merchant Rivlin Mahaf's too busy to see,' said Dev with malicious amusement. 'When do you suppose the Cinnamon Crane's boys last had to set up their stalls on the beach?'

  Gangs of youths jumped out of the flat ferryboats, pulling them high on to the dry sand. Some lads jammed poles deep into the beach before stringing gaily coloured awnings between them. Others busied themselves opening caskets packed with small bottles of glass bright in nests of tandra pod fibres. The rest were setting out sets of copper and silver bowls, unwrapping bolts of cloth, plain and patterned, mostly cotton but a few of shimmering silk. The boys soon turned their boats into enticing stalls laden with luxuries that made Dev and Bidric's offerings look very paltry. The crowds who'd been sauntering idly along the beach began heading for this new attraction, faces eager.

  'Time to pack up,' said Bidric philosophically.

  'I don't see why.' Dev's jaw jutted belligerently.

  'Because they'll have ten times the goods to offer.' Bidric began carefully piling up his shawls and wraps. 'And will accept trades that you and I can't afford to consider.'

  The youths were spreading out now, welcoming all comers with open arms. A stately rowing boat drew up at the water's edge and three burly men in fine silks, gold rings on every finger, stepped into the dutifully retreating wavelets. The boys ushered them respectfully to well-cushioned stools beneath shady awnings.

  'I trade on quality, not quantity' Dev cracked his knuckles, defiant.

  'You certainly have plenty of fire, for a man—' Bidric coughed apologetically. 'You stay if you want to. I'm going to sleep through the worst of the heat.' He glanced up at the sun now at the top of its arc. 'I'll come back when that lot have offloaded their dross on the fools who don't know better. I'll wager they'll be keeping back the better stuff in hopes of an audience with the warlord's ladies.' Bidric stood and waved a signal to the stripy-sailed ship, which dipped a pennant in prompt answer.

  Dev sat cross-legged for a moment and then began stacking his wares carefully together in the middle of the hide sheet. 'I'm hungry. Those fools can boil their brains in the midday sun while I find something to eat.' He folded the hide deftly, producing a leather thong from a pocket to secure it.

  'I could take that back with me, if you want.' A little self-conscious, Bidric paused in his own packing. 'Firan can bring it back to your boat once the heat's off th
e day.'

  'Firan?' Dev raised a quizzical eyebrow.

  'I'm thinking he'd be wanting to stay awhile.' Bidric ran a hand over his beard. 'And one of your girls will be wanting a nice shawl?'

  'Ready to try a dip in the secret sea, is he?' Dev smiled that predatory smile. 'Send him over at dusk. I'll be back to the Amigal by then.'

  'I don't want him tasting any other of your wares, mind,' warned Bidric in a low tone. 'If I smell cane liquor on him, I'll take a whip to his arse and then to yours.'

  'Not even a little sweetsap to stiffen his resolve?' Dev shook his head, mock chiding. 'Many a lad needs a dose of white brandy before he can put the first notch on his tally stick.'

  'Those barbarian tastes will be the death of you.' Bidric wasn't amused. 'One way or the other. I'm telling you, Dev, I don't want my sons picking up your bad habits.'

  'Blame the father who bequeathed me the northern blood,' said Dev perfunctorily. 'All right, I'll send your lad back sated and sober, never fear.' He tied the thong tight and stood brushing sand from the bagged knees of his loose trousers.

  Strolling down to cast an eye over the big galley's array of trade goods he curled his lip in a sneer. One of the burly men from the galley watched him with undisguised disdain. 'We've no use for anything you're trading, Dev. Move aside for those with clean hands.'

  Dev didn't so much as glance at the man as he took a small leather pouch from inside the breast of his tunic. Untying its neck, he shook out a few small but flawless sapphires into one leathery palm. The Cinnamon Crane's man stiffened. Dev studied the gems before pouring them back into the pouch with sudden decision. As he strode away, several of the people examining the galley's offerings watched him with uncertain expressions.

  'Good lady, I see you're interested in this wall hanging,' invited the galley merchant hastily. 'What have you got to offer me in return? We're most interested in this domain's coral beads.'

  Dev allowed himself a discreet smile. Even such trivial amusements made the game worth playing. As he moved away from the beach, broad-leaved spinefruit trees clustered in shady groves and the pale sand gave way to darker earth littered with dusty scraps of bark and leaves discarded as the trees suffered beneath the merciless sun at the end of the dry season. Even the incessant insects seemed to have fled. Visitors were shunning the baking heat in the expanses between the trees, gathering instead beneath the welcoming branches where the men and women of the island were offering meat and fruit, and cloud bread baked from ground sailer grain. Islanders and traders alike paused to witness promised goods bartered against full bellies and quenched thirsts.

  So Mahaf Coru was getting news from the south that had him shutting up his gates. What news might that be? Perhaps a likely rumour would be drifting around some resident's cook fire. Dev headed for an old woman tending a battered cauldron resting on a bed of charcoal prudently ringed with stones in a clean-swept stretch of earth. 'What's that, mother?'

  'Reed squabs cooked in pepper juice.' She squinted up, her face a web of wrinkles. 'Took them from their nests myself, still with the dew on the leaves.'

  Dev looked disappointed. 'Not had time to hang them then.'

  The old woman laughed as she drew a faded pink shawl back from her grizzled hair. 'You'll have to do better than that, youngster.'

  'I'm surprised your eyes are sharp enough to tell squabs from reed heads, if you think I'm a youth.' Dev sat down on a convenient tree root.

  'My eyes are sharp enough, though not so sharp as your tongue.' The old woman dipped her ladle into the cauldron and stirred. 'What have you to offer in exchange for the tenderest meat you'll find on this side of the island?' She picked up a battered wooden bowl but made no move to fill it.

  Dev bent forward to sniff the savoury steam appreciatively. 'I trade all sorts of things, mother.'

  'I doubt your mother even knows where you are.' She narrowed watery eyes at him, not displeased. 'I've seen you on the shore. You're a metal trader, aren't you? Bracelets, necklaces, earrings, that's what I'm wanting,' she continued briskly. 'My granddaughter looks to wed as soon as Mahaf Coru gives his nod.'

  Dev pretended to think for a moment and then reached inside his tunic. He took out a different leather bag to the one he'd taunted the galley merchants with and drew out a delicately wrought silver wrist chain. 'I'll be here a few days, mother. Feed me till I leave and I'll make your granddaughter the envy of her friends.'

  The old woman filled the bowl and, handing it over, accepted the chain. 'Soft metal,' she sniffed.

  'But pure,' countered Dev, his mouth already full. 'Not smelted from half a crucible of northern barbarian scrap.'

  The old woman gave a contemptuous snort. 'I wouldn't put their trash on a body for burying.'

  'Didn't I hear word of some of them in these waters?' Dev wolfed down sweet shreds of pale meat and red slivers of pepper fruits. 'Seeing what they can buy or steal before some warlord burns their boats to the waterline?'

  'Barbarians? No, someone's steering you astray.' The old woman stowed the chain securely deep within the breast of her many-layered dusty grey dress. 'They never come this late in the dry season. They burn redder than boiled crabs in the sun, die of it even.'

  So whatever was stirring up the local domains, it wasn't opportunists from the north. Dev tried again. 'I heard Mahaf Coru's keeping a weather eye out for some kind of trouble.' He nodded in the general direction of the warlord's compound.

  'He always does that.' The old woman busied herself peeling fleshy white roots to add to her cauldron.

  Dev handed back the bowl and stood up. 'I'll see you again, mother.' The old woman cooked a savoury stew, even if she had precious little information to season it.

  The next clump of trees sheltered a poet resolutely declaiming a florid description of setting out to sea. Dev recognised an epic he'd heard many times before.

  'Perhaps I will float on the sea of love. The surging wave will lift me up, as the sinking waters will pull me down. Now rising, now falling, the deep will take me to that ocean without a shore.'

  Unimpressed, the audience was struggling not to sink into sleep beneath the combined weights of food and the oppressive, humid heat. A hook-nosed man snored abruptly, interrupting the poet's speculations as to where the currents might take him and his travelling companions.

  Dev shook his head. The entire audience would be asleep before this inept bard with his monotonous mumble told how a failed romance had driven him to voyaging, lamenting his beloved's loss along with the fatigue of travel. And the poet would be going hungry. No one would offer him a noon meal in return for such a lacklustre performance.

  Amused, Dev savoured the lingering taste of pepper in his own mouth and moved on. The better poets would appear with the dusk, courted with the finest food the locals could offer. True artists would work new variations on the time-honoured themes of the travel epic, favourite metaphor for life's journey. Some would have musicians and dancers to accompany them. Others would have apprentices displaying scrolls of exquisite illustrations to the awestruck crowds.

  They were welcome to such turgid entertainments. Dev preferred those performed away from the main throng, in the shadows of a small fire coloured with handfuls of dramatic powders, their verses enhanced by one or two scantily clad dancers, a well-muscled assistant ready to slap down anyone getting too close. Dev looked around. There'd been a one-handed poet, last time he'd visited this trading beach, a remarkably inventive lad for lascivious stanzas detailing the consolations a traveller might find to replace the woman he'd left behind.

  Dev nodded slowly to himself. The one-handed poet had been summoned to entertain Mahaf Coru's guards every night, him and his accommodating dancing girls. Mahaf Coru and his wives might not be admitting any traders but a poet entertaining their guards might pick up some useful gossip.

  Who might know if the boy was still hereabouts? Ifal, that's who. Come to that, Ifal always had the latest news. Dev paused and looked towards the sea shi
mmering in the sun. He shaded his eyes with a leathery hand and tried to distinguish between the distant pennants hanging limply at the mastheads of the lazily bobbing boats.

  A lively bustle at his back startled him and he whirled around. One hand went to the Yava-styled dagger at his belt but no one was coming for him. The commotion was some way inland, where the spinefruit trees gave way to a grassy bowl ringed with the sprawling, flat-roofed houses that the Mahaf islanders favoured. The domain's elders, village spokesmen and the like would be waiting beneath the shade of their wide eaves, welcoming those traders who solicited their interest with cool fruit juices and hard bargaining. Curious, Dev hurried forward, easing past people obsequiously bowing and retreating; islanders and visitors here to trade mingling with travelling entertainers clutching their scrolls or juggling balls.

  The crowd was melting away in front of a tall, armoured man. The sun shone so brightly on his chainmail, Dev winced to look at him. Rock crystal glittered on the brow band of his helm and the gold mounts on the scabbards of his twin swords flashed diamond fire. An arresting woman strode along the path her body slave was clearing. Lean and as tall as her attendant, she wore a brocaded white tunic over gauzy trousers. Her tightly plaited hair was covered with an iridescent scarf worked in silver and gold thread, gleaming like a butterfly's wing. She swept the trailing end back over her shoulder with one hand laden with silver rings, bracelets studded with chrysolite sliding down her smoothly oiled forearm. A rope of crystal drops was wound in tight coils around the base of her slender throat.

  'Tarita Mahaf.' Some woman identified the noble lady to an ignorant visitor. 'Mahaf Coru's third and most recent wife.'

  'Born sister to Yava Dirha,' added another of the gaggle of women, eyes wide. 'She was wife to Kithir Arcis before divorcing him.'

  'Why did she do that?' wondered a fresh-faced girl.

  'That's no one's business but her own,' a woman who could only be her mother said repressively.