She squinted closer, seeing in the murky depths of the stone a tiny hunchbacked shape, a suggestion of veined wings, a tangle of thread-thin legs. A fly? She reached out to touch it, and he pulled the stone back hurriedly, holding it to his chest as though it might give him some protection from her.
‘I’m . . .’ Maniye managed a weak laugh. ‘I’m not going to hurt you.’
‘Such was never my thought, but we know by now that there are those who would hurt many to reach you. Would they risk the enmity of the Horse Society to do so? Who can say?’ He gave a sad smile, but she felt a chill run through her.
‘I cannot stay.’
‘You are our guest. My guest, since my hand-father has trusted me with this expedition. I shall shelter you as befits a host, so shall my family and all who heed me.’
‘And, as I am your guest, I cannot stay,’ she completed.
‘I would we might meet in happier times.’
She thought it was just a Horse pleasantry, but his eyes were still on her, and abruptly she felt uncomfortable.
‘I must . . .’ And she had spotted her quarry now, out beyond the tents along with his fellows. ‘I’m sorry, I must . . .’ But Alladei was nodding, saving her from hunting down further words.
Asmander was performing some sort of dance with his sword. It was not like the Tiger dances, intended to be interlaced with the leaps and raking claws of an animal. Instead, she watched as he and his stone-toothed weapon moved about one another, performing an exercise in balance. Asmander killed invisible foes for her, the sword curving and striking, but never still, and he never still at its other end, so that they seemed equal partners in the fight.
The other two were nearby: southerners together. The laughing woman had been watching the dark man intensely, and now she turned the same keen gaze on Maniye. The big old warrior was just lying on the ground with his eyes closed, letting the morning sun warm him.
When one of his strikes brought him round to face her, Asmander stopped his practice and just waited for her to approach, his weapon still to hand. His face was unreadable, save that he did not look happy.
Standing out of reach of a strike from that jagged blade, she took a deep breath and met his eyes. It’s time we spoke.
He nodded curtly, not needing her to say the words. ‘Go, find some other to bother,’ he told his friends.
‘Hmm?’ Venater opened his eyes, registered Maniye, then waved a hand idly. ‘I’m comfortable. You go, if you want.’
‘And I want to hear her put her claws in,’ Shyri said pleasantly. ‘So speak, Wolf girl – or Tiger girl, is it? Tell the Son of Asman what you think of the honour of the Riverlands.’
Asmander scowled at her, but his face was composed as he turned back to Maniye. ‘So, speak.’
In truth, ever since seeing him in the Wolf camp she had baffled herself over what she might say to him, whether she should condemn or thank him, or just ignore him. But now her life was easier, in this small way. Now she knew exactly what she must say.
‘I don’t want to talk about that – any of that,’ she told him. Now her life had contracted into a single knot and she could not indulge herself in raking over history. ‘What was that thing you Stepped to, there in the camp?’
‘That?’ Asmander frowned. ‘That is Old Crocodile. That is the shape of my people, the Patient Ones, lords of the river.’
‘And that’s a . . . this is something that exists, where you come from?’
Venater snorted, eyes still closed: ‘Is she stupid?’ And Shyri snickered.
‘Why would she know?’ Asmander chided. ‘This land is too cold for Old Crocodile. But, yes, they are common all along the Tsotec – the river of my people.’
‘Then what is the other shape you take?’ Maniye demanded of him.
‘That is the Champion. I told you so before.’
‘But what is the Champion?’ she demanded. ‘I have heard the Eyriemen talk of their Champions. I saw Yellow Claw take on the Great Eagle’s shape, when you fought him and when he snatched me from the ground. So what is your Champion?’
Understanding her at last, he nodded. ‘It has many names, like your hunters do. The Champion is Running Lizard, he is Killing Claw, Swift Reaver. But he is no beast that is known to men. The Champion comes from deep time, the priests say, a shape from the days before our fathers ever fled to this land. He came to me and he chose me to bear its soul. It is a great burden, a great glory . . .’ His voice trailed off, because Maniye was staring at him fiercely.
‘Then it’s true,’ she hissed. ‘I didn’t think of it before, but it’s true. You have two souls. You live with two souls.’
‘The soul of a Champion is not like . . .’ And he was shaking his head. ‘No, I know why you ask, but this is not what you seek. You are torn between Wolf and Tiger – they are in balance within you, so that neither can chase the other out. When the Champion’s form comes upon me, Old Crocodile shifts himself aside. He knows not to contest his kills with such a creature.’
Maniye found herself baring her teeth at him, because this was her idea, her only idea about what was happening to her and how it might be controlled. ‘I will tell Hesprec. He . . . she will find a way to help me, with this,’ and she was off, running back into the camp and looking for the priest.
She had only just tracked the Serpent girl down when a deep horn was sounded by one of the Horse sentries. They had spotted a pack of wolves breaking from the treeline.
She could not imagine what Alladei would say to Stone River when the wolf warband Stepped into human form within a spear’s cast of the camp. To her, the man’s options seemed brutally simple: hand Maniye over or bare his throat to the Wolf.
But perhaps the Horse Society always enjoyed more options than anyone else. Alladei went out to speak to Akrit, and he invited the Wolf over to his fire to talk.
Stone River came with Kalameshli and a hunter known as Sunset Spear. That Smiles Without Teeth had stayed back with the warband gave Maniye something to think about. Had Akrit told his strongest supporter to stay behind to keep the rest in line? How unruly were the warriors of the Winter Runners becoming?
She had intended to hide herself away – perhaps even to flee unnoticed if the chance arose, but Alladei himself found her and guided her to the fire where her father was waiting. He was polite but he was firm. He had Broken Axe there as well, and Hesprec – though hers was not a face Akrit would recognize any more. Loud Thunder and the southerners were close by, within earshot but not within the circle at the fire – without a voice.
The Horse people made a great show of hospitality: they had milk and meat and honey for all their guests, and Akrit was served first, his status explicitly acknowledged. In all things Alladei was the gracious and compliant host, until the formalities were observed and Akrit spoke.
‘You have something of mine,’ he said shortly. ‘The Horse are not thieves and I know they will return what they find if they know it is already promised to another.’
Alladei nodded thoughtfully. ‘I will not insult you by pretending I do not know of what you speak,’ he replied slowly. Indeed, Akrit’s glower at Maniye was unmistakable.
‘Then let me take her, and let me go.’
‘Set out your claim to her.’
Stone River stared at the Horse man narrowly. ‘She is of my tribe, and is fleeing my judgement. I am chief of the Winter Runners. I am High Chief of the Wolves.’ Though many expressions about the circle said Not yet, none gave voice to the objection, and Akrit smiled at that. ‘The Horse are welcome in the Crown of the World. I know they will do what is right.’
‘Well, it is not for a foreign visitor to your lands to argue the laws of the Wolf,’ conceded Alladei calmly. ‘As you see, I have her in my hands, and now you ask me to give her up to you. Gladly would I do so, but I find a wall between us, which I cannot fetch her through,’ And, seeing Akrit’s impatience at his speech, he continued, ‘You are my guest, Chief of the Winter Runners. She als
o is my guest. My duty to her is unyielding.’
Stone River snarled and started to say something heated, but Alladei went on, more forcefully, ‘The duty of host to guest is known to all peoples, in all lands. I would be cursed if I forsook it.’
The Wolf chief was colouring with anger, but Kalameshli leant in and murmured something that restrained him. At last he got out, ‘And how long is she to remain your guest?’
‘I suspect your coming here will prolong it,’ Alladei said, with every appearance of regret.
‘A guest that brings trouble to her host is no guest.’
Alladei spread out his hands, appealing to the sky and then to the horizon. ‘That is not a distinction that any god will make when my soul is weighed. I have taken her as my guest. I must live with that. I told the Tiger the same.’
Akrit went very still. ‘Did you so?’
‘They were equally unhappy with my words.’
Maniye kept her own face devoid of expression, knowing that any words Alladei had given the Tiger had taken place before she had ever become his guest, but of course Akrit could not know that.
‘The Horse would be unwise to anger the High Chief of the Wolves.’
‘The High Chief of the Wolves would be unwise to cut himself off from the Horse, or to give the men of the Horse more reason to aid the Tiger. All know the Shadow Eaters – that is your term? – are now down from their high places. We of the Horse have traded with Wolf and with Tiger freely, as we trade with Boar and Deer, with Seal and Hawk, and even with the Bear sometimes. Many are the goods we bring from all the lands south of the Crown of the World and, of all the families of the Horse, my hand-father Ganris heads the greatest. So let us not rattle spears, my guest.’
Maniye’s abiding memories of her father were of his short temper, but here he mastered his rage, husbanding it until he could use it. ‘So what says the Horse?’ he demanded.
‘Amongst my people we have found ourselves in this position more than once,’ Alladei said patiently. ‘It is my duty, as Hetman here, to see if the grievance between my guests may be settled by trade or by promises. I would have to know the faults laid at the feet of Many Tracks.’
Hearing her hunter’s name mentioned, Akrit’s lip curled, but he did not try to strip her of it. ‘I do not choose to recite her wrongs again,’ he replied, affecting boredom, ‘save to say that, wherever she travels, she raises enemies against the Wolf. How is it that she now turns the Horse against me?’ And now a little genuine frustration was leaking into his words. ‘For that alone, I would hunt her down.’ Then Kalameshli touched his arm, cautioning him, and he subsided. ‘There is nothing to be offered by you that can cool my need to have her. The Wolf demands her.’
‘And if I was to take her away from the Wolf, and from all the lands of the Wolf?’ Alladei asked softly.
Stone River frowned. ‘Away where?’
‘Out of the Crown of the World, to other lands where neither Tiger nor Wolf hold sway. To Where the Fords Meet, joy of the world, or to the Riverlands that lie further still. She can work no ill to you if she is so far beyond your horizon.’
Maniye expected her father to throw those words back in Alladei’s face almost immediately, but though his face twisted darkly, he said nothing for a few precious seconds. Even for such a short time, that idea was something he considered.
Have I truly become so much of an annoyance to him that he would simply be glad to see me gone? she thought, with sudden hope. Or say an embarrassment rather than an annoyance. He cannot use me against the Tiger, but so long as I am alive and free in the Crown of the World, I am something that another tribe could use to shame him. Yet if I am gone . . .
But Akrit was shaking his head. ‘It cannot be. How could I believe she was gone,’ unless I saw her corpse, was the unspoken addition that perhaps only Maniye heard. Alladei was opening his mouth, perhaps feeling that he could press his case further, but then Akrit added, ‘And, even if she were gone, what about the other betrayer?’
‘Of whom do you speak?’ Alladei was baffled.
‘Of me,’ Broken Axe put in. ‘He speaks of me.’
‘I do,’ Akrit agreed. ‘I do not know how the men of the Horse regard oaths, but this man swore many times to do my service, and yet he betrayed me and lied to my face. In the lands of the Wolf, that gives me the right to his pelt. How stands that behaviour with the Horse?’
‘It . . . is not recommended,’ Alladei said, glancing at Broken Axe. He was instantly on more unsure footing now that a real crime had been named. ‘How do you answer?’
‘These claims are true,’ Broken Axe acknowledged, ‘and my reasons for doing so are nothing that would satisfy the Wolf. But if it is I whom Stone River has run so far to catch, then let him hunt me. Let the girl go south. That is fitting. I have made all this come about. Let him hunt me alone.’
He said it with such careless calm that Maniye was almost angry with him. Seeing Alladei about to answer – perhaps even to condemn – she burst out, ‘I’m not going south.’ Everyone was staring at her now, but she squared her shoulders and went on. ‘Stone River has not caught me for two seasons, he will hunt me for two more, and two more after that. And I will run beside Broken Axe, and I will kill the Winter Runners if they are at my heels – just as I will kill the Tiger.’ They were brave words, as wildly overstated as if a coyote had threatened a bear, but she said them with absolute conviction. ‘So I will run and be free, or I shall die hunting for my freedom.’
Akrit stared at her and she waited for the raging, the hard words and invocation of the Wolf. Instead she saw a strange sadness there, quite alien to his usual expression. For just that moment – never before, surely never again – he was looking into other futures, where he and she had not grown so far apart. He was seeing the daughter he might have had, and might have valued.
She held her breath, but already his face was turning sour. ‘It seems you cannot bring harmony to your guests,’ he growled at Alladei.
‘Then my guests must leave in their own time. If Many Tracks will run, then I may not stand in her way,’ the Horse Hetman stated. ‘As I am your host, I swear that, before tomorrow dawn, she will be gone. As you are my guest, swear that until then you shall camp beyond an arrow’s flight from my fire, and make no move against her.’
Akrit said nothing, but his eyes roved the camp, plainly weighing up the prospects of forcing the issue. His warband were surely fiercer fighters than any the Horse could muster. They had iron to strengthen them. They comprised a number close to that of the Horse. Surely it was only the guest bond itself that was now holding Akrit back and, if he returned to his warriors, would that deter him?
But Maniye saw that, of the men and women of the Deer and the Boar who had been assisting the Horse, most of them had a weapon to hand. They had clubs and spears, and some had bows; they had axes and knives, and of course they had horns and tusks. With their numbers added to the Horse, the odds against the Wolves were much poorer, worse than two to one. Maniye felt as if the ground beneath her had shifted in some strange, foreboding way. The Deer and the Boar had once been subjects of the Tiger, and they were subjects of the Wolf tribes now: farmers and gatherers and fishers bowing the knee before the greatest hunters of the Crown of the World. But they were many, even so, and here they had come to work for the Horse, learning foreign ways like resistance.
Nothing was revealed on Akrit’s face, to show that he had made the same observation, but he nodded and said, ‘You have my word on it, as your guest.’ And with that, Maniye had another sunset gifted to her, another night in which to plan.
When the Wolves had left the Horse camp, she went straight to Hesprec, because she had one last chance to free herself from her shackles and her rebellious souls. And if she could not do that, then she would not even be able to run.
43
Hesprec heard her out, as Maniye presented her plan. She had so little to work with, just odd scraps of things the Serpent priest had said, and
a few things he – she – had done. Most of all she remembered how the old Snake had come along with Asmander to free her from the Eyriemen. Was that the moment the idea had been planted in her mind?
‘You made him take another shape when you took me from the Eyriemen.’
‘Asmander? Yes, I did.’
‘You gave him another soul.’
‘We invited one in together, he and I.’
And Maniye gripped the other girl’s hands and said, ‘Then do it for me.’
Hesprec regarded her warily. ‘The gods of the River, their totem, their souls . . . there is a flexibility that I think you northerners do not possess.’
‘I could not choose when the choice was before me. Now . . . they are running wild in me. Asmander said that the Champion was a chief of souls, a ruler.’
‘I suspect he did not say such words,’ Hesprec noted with a small smile. ‘But yes, you understand it right. The Champion’s soul is of a different order.’
‘Then that is the way I can stay who I am. I cannot retain my mind with two souls. I cannot drive one of them out. Even if both could be cut away from me, they would take me with them, and leave . . .’
‘Do not speak of that. It is too late for such things . . . perhaps it was too late before we ever spoke in the pit, back in your village.’
And Maniye considered Kalameshli and all his tests and his cruelty. He was trying to drive the Tiger out of me. He was trying to force me to make the choice. ‘Then . . .’ But she had no words to go after that ‘then’. They had all been spoken.
But there was a contemplative expression on Hesprec’s young face. ‘Take this dilemma to one of your Wolf priests, they would say it cannot be done: there are no Wolf Champions. Take this to a priestess of the Tiger, she would say the same.’
And hope had leapt into Maniye’s mouth: ‘But the Serpent is ancient and wise, and his people know better.’
The Tiger and the Wolf (Echoes of the Fall Book 1) Page 51
